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THE GOSPEL 



OF 



SPIRITUAL INSIGHT 



BEING 



STUDIES IN THE GOSPEL OF ST. JOHN 



r 

CHAELES F. DEEMS, D.D, LL.D. 
ii 

Pastor of the Church of the Strangers, President of the American Institute of Christian 

Philosophy, and Author of " The Gospel of Common Sense," "The Light of the 

Nations," "Chips and Chunks," "Weights and Wings," and Editor of 

"Christian Thought." 



NEW YORK 

WILBUR B. KETCHAM 

2 COOPER UNION 






v 



-s^ 



-p^ 



Copyright, 1891, by Wilbur B. Ketcham. 



PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES. 



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PREFACE. 



T"T is not spiritually healthful to keep one's mind perpetually ex 
-*- ereised in one field of thought. In the preparation of the 
"Gospel of Common Sense" my mind had been employed on the 
practical ethics of Christianity. I felt that it would be good for 
myself, as well as for my readers, to vary the study. Spiritual 
insight is helped by practical morality, and practical morality is 
aided by the cultivation of spiritual insight. So, upon laying 
down the Epistle of James, I took up the Gospel of John. 

Nothing that has ever been written about Jesus the Christ shows 
such intimacy with His character, with His head, His heart, His 
mode of thought and feeling, as the fourth Gospel. No man has ever 
had such preparation for the work of setting forth the humanity 
and the divinity of Jesus, as John the son of Zebedee. The two 
men were akin, the children of two cousins who were very holy and 
devout women. Both his heredity and environment gave to John 
special ability to perceive the intellectual and spiritual character- 
istics of Jesus. There was one other thing in him : he was a man 
of prodigious heart, and his great heart was also most tender. His 
passions could rage like a storm, and sometimes became so vehe- 
ment that his cousin Jesus called him "a son of.-thunder"; but 
they were so delicate and sweet and strong that that same Cousin, 
when dying on the cross, committed His own mother to John's 
loving care. 

It would seem profitable, therefore, to try to see the Christ with 
the eyes of John. It is for this purpose that the studies in this 
volume are written. More than a score of standpoints are taken, 
but each is a position from which the Beloved Master was seen by 
the beloved disciple. 

It is assumed that those who read this book believe in the genu- 
ineness and authenticity of the Gospel of St. John, and have never 
been troubled by the agitation of that question, or, having examined 
it, have seen how utterly futile the attacks of all hostile criticism 
have been. It may be well, however, to make a statement or two 
for the benefit of younger readers. 



IV PREFACE. 

Our Lord was crucified a.d. 30. The writer of this Gospel, St. 
John, died somewhere in the neighborhood of a.d. 100, having 
survived the crucifixion of Jesus about seventy years. This 
devoted disciple of Jesus had a devout disciple named Polycarp, 
who died a martyr about a.d. 155, having survived his master 
a half century. Now Polycarp had a learned disciple named 
Irenaeus, who became Bishop of Lyons about a quarter of a century 
after Polycarp's death, about half a century after the death of St. 
John. See what a close connection we have here ; and this is what 
Irenaeus says about Polycarp: 

"I distinctly remember the incidents of that time better than 
events of recent occurrence; for the lessons received in childhood, 
growing with the growth of the soul, become identified with it; so 
that I can describe the very place in which the blessed Polycarp 
used to sit when he discoursed, and his goings out and his comings 
in, and his manner of life, and his personal appearance, and the 
discourses which he held before the people, and how he would 
describe his intercourse with John and with the rest who had seen 
the Lord, and how he would relate words. And whatsoever things 
he had heard from them about the Lord, and about His miracles, 
and about His teaching, Polycarp, as having received them from 
eye-witnesses of the life of the Word, would relate altogether in 
accordance with the Scriptures " ; that is, the Evangely, including 
the Gospel of St. John, his master, as will appear. 

In the third book of his great work on "The Refutation and 
Overthrow of Knowledge Falsely so Called," according to the late 
Bishop Lightfoot's summary, in Contemporary Review for August, 
1876, Irenaeus relates briefly the circumstances under which the 
four Gospels were written. He points out that the writings of the 
Evangelists arose directly from the oral Gospel of the apostles. He 
shows that the traditional teaching of the apostles has been pre- 
served by a direct succession of elders, which in the principal 
congregations can be traced man by man, and he asserts that this 
teaching accords entirely with the evangelical and apostolical writ- 
ings. He maintains, on the other hand, that the doctrine of the 
heretics was of comparatively recent growth. He assumes through- 
out, not only that our four canonical Gospels alone were acknowl- 
edged among faithful Christians in his own time, but that this 



PREFACE. V 

had been so from the beginning. His antagonists, indeed, accepted 
these same Gospels, paying especial deference to the fourth Evan- 
gelist ; accordingly he argues with them on this basis. 

Let us suppose that the Gospel of St. John was in the hands of 
the Christians about a.d. 80. If written then it would have been 
fifty years after the close of the series of events which it narrates. 
That is possible. The writer of this volume has been preparing 
some historical sketches, describing, among other things, the 
appearance, acts, and words of his own great teacher, from whom 
he parted fifty years ago, and his memory is distinct as to the words 
and even the tones of that famous person. It is to be remembered 
that in the case of St. John his whole life's work, between the 
crucifixion of Jesus and the writing of the Gospel, was to repeat 
again and again the words of Jesus, and to talk them over from 
time to time with the mother of Jesus, who resided with John. 
If he gave this Gospel to the world say a.d. 80, Poly carp most 
probably had it, and Polycarp's disciple, Irenaeus, had it ; and from 
time to time both must have compared the words of the Gospel 
with the remembered words of John, and found them altogether 
in accord. Internal evidence and tradition united in assigning 
the authorship of this book to St. John ; and no one suggested any 
doubt for centuries after it was written ; and at the close of this 
century there is left but one objection, and this is based upon the 
inability of gross and sensuous minds to appreciate the spiritual 
beauty of the exquisite discourses in this Gospel. 

Whatever may be a man's learning in one or more departments, 
if there be a region of thought and feeling wholly unexplored by 
him, the most admirable representations thereof will seem to him, 
as, for instance, the Gospel of St. John does to the learned and able 
M. Renan, " false, insipid, impossible," while admitting that, 
' ' considered in itself, the narrative of the material circumstances 
of the life of our Lord, as furnished by the fourth Evangelist, is 
superior in point of verisimilitude to the narrative of the other 
three Gospels." 

On the theory that St. John was not inspired, we are obliged to 
place him at the head of all human writers, and his Gospel at the 
top of all human literature. He has done what has been attempted 
by every great genius. They have failed ; he has succeeded. 



VI PREFACE. 

Homer, iEschylus, Virgil, Dante, Shakespeare, Milton, Goethe, 
and Bulwer have failed where John has succeeded, namely, in 
making the supernatural natural. This is certainly worth consid- 
ering. It was probably this which led M. Renan to apply the 
epithet "impossible" to passages of St. John's Gospel. It was 
because he did not believe miracles possible that he characterized 
portions of the Gospel as ""false." He knew that all those great 
geniuses whose names we have given above had failed in this de- 
partment, and took it for granted that John must fail also ; but 
that John has not failed the consciousness of the centuries attest. 
There is nothing in all that he presents to us of the supernatural 
which is at all shocking to men, or women, or children, who read 
this Evangely. In it the crucified and risen Christ seems as nat- 
ural a person as the living and preaching Jesus. If St. John did 
not give the real facts in the case under supernatural guidance, 
then he is superior, immeasurably superior, to all the greatest 
geniuses that have breathed the breath of human life. So in any 
case, in dealing with the Gospel of St. John we are studying the 
highest production of human literature. 

Many years ago I wrote a book, the first name of which was 
" Jesus." The publishers who bought it, after an edition had been 
sold, changed its name to " The Light of the Nations," and large 
editions have been circulated. In making the studies for this 
volume a number of points had been treated in that book, and 
upon examination I discovered that I can now write no better on 
those subjects ; so by the permission of the proprietors I have 
used sometimes whole paragraphs of that book in this volume. 
This has been mostly done in the latter part. 

As the writer of this volume approached the study of each topic, 
not in a critical spirit, not in a controversial spirit, but tenderly 
and devoutly, that he might see as far as possible into the heart of 
God by seeing into the heart of Jesus, he ventures to express the 
hope that his readers will peruse these pages in the same spirit. 
If the reading prove as profitable to them as the writing has been 
to him, verily he will reap a great reward. 

CHARLES F. DEEMS. 



CONTENTS. 

i. 

PAGES 

The Incarnation a Divine Necessity 1-16 

The Fundamental TJwught — "Right " and " Wrong " 
— Recognized Authority — Data of Morality: Questions 
— Revelation — The Beginning — Man Anticipated — 
The Bible Came Early— " The Word"— John's Rela- 
tion to Jesus — The Incarnation from Man's Side — 
The Incarnation from God's Side — " So Loved the 
World." 

n. 

The Christ's First Disciples 17-31 

The u Forerunner" Appears — The Christ Appears 
— The Christ Disappears and Reappears — John's 
Testimony — An Impressive Narrative — Disciples 
Coming — How They Came — First Word of the Christ 's 
Ministry — The Second Word — What is " a Church"? 
— Practical Lessons from this History. 

III. 
The Christ's First Miracle 33-49 

Back to Nazareth — The Most Celebrated Wedding — 
The Going to a Pleasure Party — Jesus the Glorifica- 
tion of Nature — The Mother of Jesus — The Mother's 
Speech to Tier Son — The Son's Reply to His Mother— 
An Impoi'tant Distinction — How Mary Received it — 
What Jesus did — Practical Lessons. 



Vlll CONTENTS. 

IV. 

PAGES 

The Secret Disciple 51-66 

The Christ's Insight into Man — Nicodemus — His 
Night Visit to the Christ — Prompt Discourse — Great 
Admissions — Jesus Dogmatic — A Startled Philosopher 
— The Profound Reply of Jesus. 

V. 

The Samaritan Convert 67-85 

Flying from Popularity — Jews and Samaritans — 
The Well of Jacob — The Woman of Samaria — The 
Methods of the Christ — The Woman's Characteristics 
— Becoming Interested — Thirst — Uncertain Sight — 
Four Essentials for Soul Saving — The Discerner of 
Hearts — The Wideness of the Gospel. 

VI. 

The Great Claim of Jesus 87-101 

Jesus Charged with Sabbath-breaking — The Christ's 
Defense — His August Claim — Sublime View of the 
Godhead — The Power over Life — The Power of Judg- 
ment — The Extent of Christ's Claims — The Repeated 
" Verily." 

VII. 

The Miraculous Feeding 103-118 

Trying Times — An Attempted Retreat — At Work 
Again— The Disciples in Trouble — Jesus Brings Re- 
lief—The Christ's Compassion: Quiet and Diet — The 
Arithmetic of God — The Majestic Simplicity of the 
Christ — His Simple Devoutness — The Employment of 
Others — The Touch of the Lord : and Simple Obedi- 
ence — Economy and Abundance — The Godlike Christ. 



CONTENTS. IX 

VIII. 

PAGES 

The Food of Immortality 119-130 

The Christ Again Disappears — A Reproach, an Ex- 
hortation, and a Promise — Some Spiritual Light — 
Credentials of Messialiship Demanded — The Powerless- 
ness of Miracles — Where is the Bread of Immortality ? 
— A Very Great Comfort. 

IX. 

The Drink of Immortality 131-140 

Feast of Tabernacles — The Supplemental Festival — 
The Sudden Appearance of Jesus — The Great Day 
of the Feast — The Great Invitation — What tlie Invita- 
tion Included — He was Speaking of the Holy Spirit. 

X. 

Spiritual Lineage 141-154 

_" Never Man Spake like this Man " — What it is to 
be a Disciple — The Love of Freedom — The Christ's 
Appeal to that Love — Knowing the Truth — Consistent 
Philosophy — The Cure for Infidelity — The Slavery of 
Sin — Spiritual Paternity and Heredity — Father Abra- 
ham—Two Test Questions. 

XI. 

Sight and Insight 155-166 

A Blind Man — Blind and "Bom Blind" — A Meta- 
physical Conundrum — Pain in the Universe — The 
Miraculous Healing — A Test of Faith — Obedience — A 
Judicial Investigation. 

XII. 
The Beautiful Good Shepherd 167-178 

Mixed Metaphors — The Sheepfold — Characteristics 
of a Good Shepherd — How Flocks are Formed — A 
Second Allegory. 



X CONTENTS. 

XIII. 

PAGES 

The Life and the Kesurrection 179-196 

Bethany — Remaining in Perea — Lazarus is "Sleep- 
ing " — Jesus Returns to Bethany — Martha's Speech — 
A Prodigious Claim — Mary and Jesus — A Lofty 
Grief— The Crisis of Jesus. 

XIV. 

The Christ Foretelling His Death 197-204 

The First Day in the Last Week— Greek Desire to 
see Jesus — Jesus wishes to see those who wish to see 
Him — "What Shall I Say?" — A Voice which Jesus 
knew. 

XV. 

Divine Humility— Feet Washing ...... 205-218 

The Last Passover — His " Own" — Causes of Strife 
— An Immortal Object-Lesson — Impression on the Dis- 
ciples — Peter's Outburst — The Christ's Answer to 
Peter — Peter and Judas. 

XVI. 

Jesus Consolator 219-232 

Still at the Supper — Text of the Discourse: Trouble 
— Consolation — The Roots of Trouble — A Wide Hope — 
The Tenderest Speech — Another Comforter — Another 
Word of Sweetness^ 

XVII. 

The Vine and the Branches 233-244 

The Supper Ended — The Discourse of the Vine — 
The Christ is God's Only Vine — Fruitless Branches — 
Fruitful Branches— Abiding in Him — Reasons for 
Abiding — A Tonic. 



CONTENTS. XI 

XVIII. 

PAGES 

The Consummate Consolation 245-256 

Forewarning — Valedictory— The Holy Spirit and 
the World — Sin — Righteousness — Judgment — The 
Holy Spirit and the Disciples — The Holy Spirit and 
the Christ. 

XIX. 

The Divine Soliloquy 257-269 

The Christ Talking to Himself— For Himself— What 
He had done — Eternal Life — For His Disciples — 
Prayer for the World — The Prayer Fulfilled. 

XX. 

The Great Betrayal 271-282 

Remarkable Literature — Withdrawal to Gethsemane 
— T/ie Divine Agony — The Treacherous Kiss — The 
Divine Self- Control. 

XXI. 

The Christ Suffering under Pontius Pilate ; or, 

The Civil Trial of Jesus ........ 283-304 

XXII. 

Earth's Greatest Tragedy 305-324 

The First Word from the Cross — The Second Word 
from the Cross — The Third Word from the Cross — 
The Fourth Word from the Cross— The Fifth, Sixth, 
and Seventh Words from the Cross. 

XXIII. 

The Key-stone Fact of Christianity .... 325-341 

The Crucial Question — He was Dead. 



Xll CONTENTS. 

XXIV. 

PAGES 

The Christ in Both Worlds 343-365 

Appearance of the Risen Jesus — Tfie First Preacher 
of the Gospel a Woman — The Thread of the Story — 
Appearing to Peter — Appearing to the Disciples going 
to Emmaus — Appearing to the Ten — The Risen Mas- 
ter eats with His Disciples — Gives Them the Holy . 
Spirit — Appearing to Tlwmas — Going to Galilee — 
Appearance by the Sea of Tiberias — Appearance to a 
Great Company— Appearance to James — His Final 
Appearance — Characteristics of His Appearances. 



I. 

Qfyt jhuatnatton a Utotne Nmsssttg. 



John I. 

(1) In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God 
and the Word was God. [The Word never was without God.] (2) 
The same was in the beginning with God. [God never was with- 
out the Word.] (3) All things were made by Him ; and without Him 
was not any thing made that hath been made. [The Word is the un- 
created Creator of all things.] (4) In Him was life : and the life was 
the light of men. [The Word is the only living existence that never 
received life, but has produced all things that live.] (14) And the 
Word became [not "was made"] flesh, and dwelt among us, full 
of grace and truth : and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only- 
begotten from the Father. (18) No one hath ever seen God. The 
only-begotten Son, being in the bosom of the Father, He only hath 
declared [God]. [In Him only is the inside of God turned outward 
to the world.] 



THE 



Gospel of Spiritual Insight 



THE INCARNATION A DIVINE NECESSITY. 

THE FUNDAMENTAL THOUGHT. 

THE fundamental thought of all religion and mor- 
ality is the existence of a personal God. It is 
certain that there can be neither philosophical nor 
practical morality without religion. It is of the essence 
of what is ethical that it be binding. To be binding it 
must be set forth by something which has authority. 
No thing which is not a person can be thought of as 
having any authority. Religion is a binding sense of re- 
sponsibility to that person who has the supreme right to 
say what shall be and what shall not be; and who has the 
omniscience to know when His laws are obeyed and when 
they are violated; and who has the power to punish and 
reward and who will never fail to inflict penalty in every 
case of violation and give reward in every case of obedi- 
ence; and who shall have the wisdom, justice, goodness, 
and power to adjust both the punishment and the 
reward exactly according to the deserts of each moral 
agent. 

Is it not perfectly manifest that all this is required to 
produce any thing that approaches practical morality ? 



4 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

And is it not quite as plain that the conception of such 
a Being is equivalent to the conception of a Personal 
God? 

If it be not immediately apparent that this is indis- 
pensable for any ethics that can be of use in making 
what men regard as a good life, sit down quietly and try 
to frame a system which shall not make any account 
whatever of a Personal God, and yet shall furnish the 
data and sanctions of morality. 

"EIGHT" AND "WRONG." 

First of all, is there really any such a thing as l( right " 
or ' ' wrong " ? If one be, there must be the other. If 
either, what do you mean by it ? By the word 
" wrong," for instance ? Can you conceive of any thing 
wrong without reference to some rule ? Of course you 
can not. What, then, do you mean by "rule"? Is it 
not some fixed instrument of measure? You wish to 
cut off exactly a yard from a piece of cloth ; you fetch 
one end of the cloth to one end of the yardstick and 
draw the cloth along to the other end of the stick • then 
you cut off your cloth and are sure that you have a yard, 
and if any one doubts he is asked to try it by the meas- 
ure. There is no room for any argument whatever. All 
the lawyers in a city might divide themselves into two 
ranks and bring their practiced powers for a whole day 
to the discussion of the question whether or not this 
were a yard of cloth. No process of reasoning could 
settle that question without practical measurement. 
Two things that are each exactly equal to a third thing are 
exactly equal to each other: that is an axiom, a statement 
quite self-evident. But what have you done in the case 



THE GOSPEL 0£ SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 5 

of your cloth ? You have simply ascertained that two 
things — the piece Of cloth and the yardstick — are equal 
to each other, but you have not ascertained that either 
is equal to the third thing. It is that third thing, that 
middle term, which is still wanting. How do you know 
that your yardstick is correct ? Your yardstick may be 
a little shorter or a little longer than the standard. You 
must be sure that that particular yardstick is exactly of 
the length of some standard measure fixed by authority. 
You can not assure yourself that you have a yard of cloth 
until you feel quite sure that the yardstick is precisely 
equal to a certain measure of thirty-six inches which has 
been fixed by law and set forth by authority. If there 
be no such authority there can be no yardstick. One 
man has as much right to claim eleven inches as another 
man to insist on thirteen or a third man to be content 
with five inches. 

RECOGNIZED AUTHORITY. 

You see you are driven, in the beginning of com- 
merce, in the mere matter of the weights and the 
measures of commodities, to have a common recogni- 
tion, by yourself and the man with whom you trade, of 
an authority from whose decision there is no appeal as 
to what constitutes a yard of cloth, a gallon of oil, and 
a ton of coal. In the much more important matter of 
morals, is it not indispensable to have some measure or 
rule of right and wrong ? What is right ? What is 
wrong ? Is not the former that which is in accord with 
some rule and the latter that which deviates from some 
rule ? But can there be a rule without some Supreme 
Person or body of persons having paramount authority ? 



6 TEE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

As in the case of the cloth, let us try something which 
is generally supposed to have moral Quality. 

There is a man who has a wife and three young chil- 
dren. They are dependent upon him for a support. He 
is very useful to the community. He helps many and 
hurts none. He has given me all that I have and made 
it possible for me to grow rich and famous. One day, 
as he sits in the midst of his family, I kill him without 
any provocation. Have I done wrong, any more wrong 
than if I had broken a withered limb from a tree in a 
forest ? How will you show that I have done wrong ? 
You must appeal to some rule. What rule ? 

DATA OF MORALITY : QUESTIONS. 

It is under the pressure of such a question that an 
agnostic sets himself to the ethical question and begins 
to collect "Data of Morality/' When collected, of 
what avail are they ? You might have a hundred yard- 
sticks, and yet unless you were sure that one of them at 
least had been compared with the standard measure of a 
yard, you could not be sure that you had measured off 
exactly a yard of cloth. Suppose, for instance, I had 
discovered after long research that a certain course 
of action promoted the greatest good of the greatest 
umber of human beings, and could demonstrate it so 
that all men would receive it, and we should decide 
that to pursue this course would be right and to do 
otherwise would be wrong : then would arise these 
questions : 

1. Before this demonstration, before any one could 
know that a certain course of action would promote the 
greatest good of the greatest number, was the action in 



THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 7 

accordance with that course right and was the opposite 
wrong ? 

2. Can we be perfectly sure that there was no mistake 
in collecting the facts and in conducting the process of 
reasoning ? Might not that which promotes the greatest 
good of the greatest number in a few small cultivated 
English, German, French, or American circles fail to 
promote the greatest good of the greatest number in the 
mass of the population of the planet, which must em- 
brace the Russias, the Indies, China, and Africa, with 
all the teeming hordes of sav*ages in unpenetrated places 
of the earth? Who but a Being of infinite intelligence 
could ascertain what conduct would promote the greatest 
good of the greatest number ? There must be a Personal 
God or else there is no distinction, except that which is 
merely verbal, between right and wrong. But all men, 
everywhere, at all times, have had the moral sense. It 
is ineradicable. They may differ as to what is right and 
what is wrong, but they never doubt the distinction. 
The moral sense in man necessitates the thought of the 
Personal God. 

3. But suppose I am perfectly assured that a certain 
course of action will promote the greatest good of the 
greatest number : what binds me to pursue that course ? 
What are "the greatest number "to me? They have 
never done any thing for me. My connections, my in- 
terests, my affections, are all concerned with much the 
smaller number. There are men who care for so small a 
number as one ; " Number one," says such a man, mean- 
ing himself, " is what I am going to look after." Why 
should he not ? Who can show any reason for not con- 
sidering him to be as wise, as good, and as great a man 



8 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

as his neighbor who is always insisting on the " greatest 
number " ? If there be no Personal God, is not the man 
wiser who rejects what it is impossible for any finite be- 
ing to ascertain, namely, what conduct makes for the 
greatest good of the greatest number and the obligation 
of any man to pursue that course of conduct ? The ac- 
knowledgment of the authority of conscience necessitates 
the thought of the Personal God. 

REVELATION. 

For any purpose of good, great, and happy living no 
man need bother himself with any question as to the 
mode of existence of the personality of God. Let him 
content himself with the fact of that personality. A 
God is a person : He has consciousness of His own exist- 
ence ; He reflects upon His own thoughts ; He has 
emotions ; He has conscious volitions, and He performs 
acts according to preconceived plans and methods and 
with a knowledge of their moral character. 

But we men are also persons. It becomes a most im- 
portant thing to know what are our relations to this 
august divine Person ; and of still more importance 
what He regards as His relations to us. How is that 
to be learned ? How do I know what my father, my 
enemy, or my jailer thinks of his relations to me if 
I never see him, nor hear from him, nor see anything 
he has done ? It is plain that if God makes no revela- 
tion of Himself I can never know any of His thoughts or 
feelings or volitions. The moment the thought of the 
Personal God is given any man, he thinks of Him as 
Absolute, Infinite, and Eternal. Without some revela- 
tion from God Himself, the man can think of Him no 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 9 

further, except along the lines logically suggested by 
these three necessary conceptions of the Personal God. 
He can not know whether the God agrees with the man's 
ideas of what is good or bad, kind or cruel, or whether 
He ever thinks of the man at all. He can not know 
whether this God made him or begat him. He does not 
know how to speak to God. He must wait until God 
speaks to him. 

THE BEGINNING. 

But God has spoken ; He has made some revelation 
of Himself in nature, to begin with. Whether the man 
believes in the immediate creation of the body of the 
first man or holds that that body was a development of 
previous forms of animal existence, He can reason to 
God's interest in the matter because, on any theory, 
after, the admission of the existence of God, God had 
every thing to do with the beginning. Just get back to 
the beginning, and there you confront God or nothing. 
But human nature is the very nature that abhors a 
vacuum and will not accept "nothing," and if you will 
only place it at the beginning of all beginnings it is 
compelled to accept God. Just write out on a piece of 
paper, " In the beginning," and you are obliged to put 
for the next word just what the next word is in the first 
sentence of the Bible — "God." 

It does not require the most extensive or profound 
knowledge of man and of nature to see that whoever 
created this planet has a tender regard for man, a prov- 
ident care for him, and high thoughts of his possibil- 
ity. Indeed, a scientific knowledge of the physical 
constitution of the planet shows that its Maker must 



10 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

have had in view the coming of a person of intelligent 
activity, capable of subduing, improving, and beautifying 
the planet, if only the materials were laid to his hand. 
And the Maker of the planet laid those materials to his 
hand, having them all completely ready for his coining 
and not introducing him until all those things were 
here. 

MAN ANTICIPATED. 

Indeed, there is no rational explanation of the consti- 
tution of the planet, except that it was made to be the 
workshop, the theater, the battle-field, the home of an 
intelligent, god-like race. Volumes could be filled with 
the amplification of that single sentence. Take coal, 
for instance. Why should the ages have been occupied 
in the production, the piling, the pressure, of that vast 
amount of vegetable matter which makes the coal 
measures of the planet, if no such being as man should 
ever inhabit this globe ? No other animal needs it; but 
to man it has been wind in the sails of his progress, 
wafting him to more glorious shores of civilization. The 
whole planet looks like a house which a father had built 
and furnished for a child whose character he knows and 
of whose coming he was sure. 

Every intelligent builder erects his structure with 
reference to the uses to which it is to be applied. On 
examination it immediately shows, by being a nest, a 
sty, a kennel, a stable, a residence, whether it was 
intended for bird, or pig, or dog, or horse, or man. It 
seems impossible to examine the structure of the earth 
without perceiving that its Creator knew that man was 
coming and that He took the most profound interest in 
man and all his belongings. Indeed, if it were not 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL LHSIGHT. 11 

recorded in the Scriptures it might be possible from 
the existence of coal to reach the suggestion that God 
had loved man i( with an everlasting love." 

THE BIBLE CAME EARLY. 

But men were not left to the weary study of the 
material world, to pick out through the ages, here and 
there, some indication of some trait of the divine char- 
acter. After the theistic idea had been revealed to man, 
then, and not till then, did "the invisible things of 
Him" become "understood by the things which are 
made," but could never have been discovered unless 
"God had showed it unto them" (Rom. i., 19, 20). 
The Bible was given to the race early. So after the 
Bible had told us that God is infinitely wise and power- 
ful and good, that He is the source of all life, physical 
and spiritual, that He has plans requiring the eternities 
for their execution, that He is the sole holy, merciful, 
and just Autocrat of the Universe, having paramount 
legislative, judicial, and executive authority over all 
things, then all progress in physical science goes to 
illuminate what had elsewhere been revealed. 

It is worthy of note that the Bible began to be given 
to our race in the early childhood of mankind, and that 
it was completed before any thing that can properly be 
called science arose among men. The world could not 
wait. It must early learn what God is, what He thinks 
of men, what He thinks of His relations to men, what is 
right and what is wrong. For all the aids which science 
can give to civilization the race may wait ; but a code 
of ethics, a directory of religion, a knowledge of what 
man's relation is to man and what man's relation is to 



12 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IXSIGHT. 

God — these were absolutely required in the very begin- 
ning. And in the very beginning they began to be given. 
The very relation, in point of time, of the Bible's ancient 
revelations and the modern discoveries of science shows 
divine affection for man. The former were as necessary 
to the latter as the multiplication-table is to the integral 
and differential calculus, and physical science can no more 
overturn the Bible than the calculus can overturn the 
multiplication-table. 

Moses's history opens with the creation : "In the be- 
ginning God created the heavens and the earth." 

John's gospel opens with the incarnation : " In the 
beginning was the Word : and the Word was God ; and 
the Word became flesh and dwelt amongst us," which 
simply means that God voluntarily incarnated Himself. 

The details of the birth of Jesus are given elsewhere 
in the New Testament. John simply announces the fact 
that He who, when the beginning began, was the very 
God, had become a very man. 

"THE WORD." 

From the opening of the Bible all through the Old 
Testament we have the Word of God, the Logos. The 
creation is represented as caused by God speaking. And 
the idea runs through the histories, the psalms, and the 
prophecies, and it is found in the Apocrypha and the 
Targums. So when the ideas of Judaism came to be 
modified by contact with Greek thought, there arose a 
sort of Judseo- Alexandrine philosophy set forth by Philo, 
who was a contemporary of Jesus. This philosophy may 
have been known to Jesus and to John. What Meyer 
says represents it: 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 13 

" That idea of God's essential self -revelation which 
took its rise from Genesis i., which lived and grew under 
various forms and names among the Hebrews and later 
Jews, but was moulded in a peculiar fashion by the Alex- 
andrine philosophy, was adopted by John for the purpose 
of setting forth the abstract divinity of the Son, thus 
bringing to light the reality which lies at the foundation 
of the Logos idea. Hence, according to John, by 6 Xoyog, 
which is throughout viewed by him (as is clear from the 
entire Prologue down to verse 18) under the conception 
of a personal subsistence, we must understand nothing 
else than the self -revelation of the divine essence, before 
all time immanent in God (comp. Paul, Col. i., 15 ff), 
but for the accomplishment of the act of creation pro- 
ceeding hypostatically from Him, and ever after operating 
also in the spiritual world as a creating, quickening, and 
illuminating personal principle, equal to God Himself in 
nature and glory (comp. Paul, Phil, ii., 6); which divine 
self-revelation appeared bodily in the man Jesus and ac- 
complished the work of the redemption of the world. " 

JOHN'S RELATION TO JESUS. 

It is never to be forgotten that John was the intimate 
friend of Jesus. Other Evangelists were inspired by the 
Holy Ghost, but in addition to that John had the ad- 
vantage of the confidential intimacy of Jesus — he rested 
on His bosom. He was the beloved disciple. For my 
own part, so thoroughly has this thought taken posses- 
sion of me that I read the word of John as I would those 
of a stenographer who had taken the dictation of Jesus. 
It is the statement by Jesus of His self-consciousness. 
So it is proposed to read all that this apostle writes. 



14 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

THE INCARNATION FROM MAN'S SIDE. 

The Incarnation is ordinarily thought of, written of, 
and preached of, from the side of man's necessities. We 
have sinned, we have become degraded as well as guilty. 
We need salvation and deliverance and therefore a Sav- 
iour and a Deliverer. All that means that the relation 
between God and man has been interrupted and must be 
restored if there is not to be a measureless catastrophe 
to each individual of the race. We must have God. 
It is this necessity which gives such glow and glory to 
the announcement that the Lord has bowed His heavens 
and come down, and that the Father of Eternity has 
become the Son of Man. It is every thing for us. It 
tells of broken chains and opened prisons and cleansed 
leprosy and a new life and restoration to the Father's 
house and perpetual ascent and endless glory. To make 
us know that we are His (, 'own," that we are His "chil- 
dren," He has come to us in our nature. The fullest 
worship that lifts the soul, the service that most thor- 
oughly purines the life, can be given only to the incar- 
nated God. The incarnation of God is, then, a human 
necessity. 

By this is meant not a fatal necessity, but a moral 
and a logical necessity. Knowing God as He has revealed 
Himself, are we not compelled to see that His love would 
impel Him to appear in the flesh ? 

THE INCARNATION FROM GOD'S SIDE. 

Is not the Incarnation also a divine necessity ? If the 
teaching be true that God is the Father of the human 
race; that He had doted on us in all eternity; that He 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 15 

had created and fitted the earth to be our school ; that 
He had created and trained the angels to be our ever- 
lasting servants ; that heaven could not be heaven to 
God until he had His children gathered into His home ; 
and that those children were here in the flesh bearing 
the burdens and strains of their moral and spiritual edu- 
cation ; that those children had gone away from that 
true manhood which is the only likeness of God ; that 
they had fallen under the degrading and despairing be- 
lief that the Father was no longer their Father; that He 
hated them and pursued them with malignity, while all 
the while, as He knew and they did not, He yearned for 
them with an unspeakable desire — how could He keep 
back, how could He stay*away, how could He remain in 
His delightful palace while His children were pining, 
some in hospitals, and some in prisons, and some in 
noisome dens, afflicted with deafnesses, blindnesses, lep- 
rosies, paralyses, and, above all, an occasional agonizing 
sense of spiritual forsakenness, all which He could 
cure by coming in the flesh and dwelling among them — 
would He, could He, abstain from incarnation ? 

"SO LOVED THE WORLD." 

His intimate friend John reports from the lips of Jesus 
a statement of His own everlasting self-consciousness : 
" God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten 
Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish 
but have everlasting life/' Have we not always been 
reading that most extraordinary statement from the hu- 
man side ? Did not Jesus see it also from the divine 
side ? " God so loved the world !" How? That He 
must come to it, that His poor blind children may touch 



16 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 



Him and feel 



-t with Him, and know that He 



in repor 

had the sense of coming to His "own." He "was 
found" was "found in fashion as a man." 

As man's thought of perfection is in seeking to be 
divine, so God's perfection is found in being a Man. 
And what a Man ! All the fine abstract conceptions of 
deity by the philosophers, all the marvelous poetic rep- 
resentations of Zeus-Pater by the poets, all the high 
thoughts of Jehovah by the Hebrew bards, all are infe- 
rior to that Man, Jesus, who dwelt among men, peasant 
men, rich men, poor men, doctors of divinity, priests of 
Israel and soldiers of Eome, and for thirty-three years 
walked among men so as to satisfy the demands of the 
human intellect and the human heart as all the other 
thoughts of God had failed to do, and, as we believe, 
satisfied the demands of God's intellect and heart as they 
never had been satisfied before. 

What a God is the Jesus of the Evangelists ! Men 
have never heard of any thing higher to adore. Angels 
never had such a revelation of God as they had in Jesus. 
Man was never satisfied until he beheld the realization 
of the ideal of Manhood in Jesus : and God was never 
satisfied until He gave "His only begotten Son" to 
" the world " and was found in Christ reconciling the 
world unto Himself. 

Was not the Incarnation a divine necessity ? 



II. 

2flje ©prist's JHrst Msciples. 



John I. 

(35) Again, on the day after, John was standing and two of his 
disciples ; (36) and, looking upon Jesus as He was walking, he said, 
"Behold God's Lamb!" (37) And the two disciples heard him 
speak and went after Jesus. (38) But Jesus turning and seeing 
them coming after Him says to them : What [not whom] are you 
seeking 9" But they said to Him, "Rabbi {which being inter- 
preted is to say " Teacher "), where stay est Thou ? " (39) He says to 
them, " Come, and you shall see." They came and saw where He 
stayed, and they stayed with Him that day. It was about the tenth 
hour. (40) One of the two that heard John speak and followed 
Him was Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter. (41) This one first 
finds his own brother Simon and says to him, ' ' We have found 
the Messiah," which being interpreted is, the Christ [Anointed]. 
(42) He led him unto Jesus. Looking upon Him, Jesus said, 
" Thou art Simon, the son of John ; thou shalt be called Kephas, 
which is interpreted Stone" [Peter]. 



THE CHRIST'S FIRST DISCIPLES. 
THE "FORERUNNER" APPEARS. 

WHEN the Incarnation took place, the world of 
men was at its lowest depth. It was the darkest 
hour of man's deepest midnight. The Greek civiliza- 
tion of culture was effete, the Roman civilization 
of power was brutal, the Jewish civilization of relig- 
ion was a corpse of formalism. So blinded were all 
eyes then, that the Christ of God was in the world more 
than a quarter of a century before any one recognized 
Him. He had come to His own and His own had not 
known Him. 

Then there appeared in the Jordan Valley a man of 
austere manners and ascetic habits who began to preach 
terrifically. The sinfulness of the world had struck 
his imagination as something surpassingly horrible. He 
fairly howled against it. He cried to his countrymen 
to repent. The sound of his voice aroused an echo in 
the consciences of the people, and thousands flocked to 
his ministry. The people of culture, the most preten- 
tious of the day, the Pharisees and Sadducees, came to 
his baptism. Men who had been accustomed to be 
greeted in the market-places with most profound respect 
heard themselves called a "generation of vipers." 
Men who had passed as the representatives of religion 
were told in effect that they were no more than the 
stones on the river-bank. But John's baptism and 



20 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

preaching were not Christian, they were not models of 
Christian baptism and preaching. John himself was no 
Christian. He was no functionary. He was a layman with 
a divine mission. That mission was to designate the 
Messiah, the Christ, the Anointed of Jehovah. He knew 
that He was in the world. He knew he should meet 
Him. It would then be his business to point out the 
Christ and to retire from public life. 

THE CHRIST APPEARS. 

So he went on living, preaching and baptizing in 
such an extraordinary way as to attract universal atten- 
tion, but still no man appeared in whom met the signs 
which John had been divinely instructed should point 
out the Messiah. Was it all to come to nothing ? One 
day, as the weary and probably discouraged preacher was 
at his work, there came up to him a Galilean peasant of 
nearly his own age. John did not know that it was 
Jesus of Nazareth. Even if he had been told that it was 
Jesus there was nothing whatever in the appearance of 
the simple, serene man to indicate that He was Jehovah's 
Christ. Of all the throng no man, except the Baptist, 
noticed that there was any thing peculiar in the stranger. 
But when they confronted each other the Baptizer felt 
that the hour had come, and he, that was the most famous 
man in his land at the moment, modestly said to the 
stranger, " I have need to be baptized of Thee, and comest 
Thou to me?" The stranger answered him, "Suffer 
it." As if the voice of Jehovah had spoken to his soul 
John obeyed, and then all signs combined to make 
John know who it was that had now come to his 
baptism. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 21 



THE CHRIST DISAPPEARS AND REAPPEARS. 

After His baptism Jesus walked away from the river 
at which the voice of God had been heard acknowl- 
edging Him and the dove of the Spirit had settled on 
His head. He made no address to the crowd ; He 
spake no word to John. Up into the wilderness He went. 
And nothing followed. Week after week passed with- 
out sign or wonder. Jesus was in the wilderness un- 
dergoing that terrible season of fasting and tempta- 
tion. John was at the river undergoing the badgering 
of the minions of the Sanhedrim. At last at the close 
of seven weeks the divine Stranger approached the 
throng which were about John. How worn must John 
have been by the labors of his protracted meeting ! How 
wan and ghastly Jesus, after His terrific battle and great 

victory ! 

JOHN'S TESTIMONY. 

When John saw Jesus he exclaimed, ' ( Behold God's 
Lamb, which taketh away the sins of the world ! " And 
then he added, " This is He of whom I said, ' After me 
cometh a man which is preferred before me * ; for He was 
before me. And I knew Him not ; but that He should 
be made manifest to Israel, therefore am I come baptiz- 
ing with water." The testimony of John sets forth 
several things : 

1. The Messiah under figure of Jehovah's Lamb, 
the offering selected by Jehovah for sacrifice, was familiar 
to his hearers, and had been familiar to their fathers 
from the days of Isaiah (liii., 7). This is that Lamb, 
said John. 

2. No power exists in nature to relieve any man of 



22 THE GOSPEL OP SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

the guilt and consequences of his sin. If God do not 
provide some atonement, expiation, propitiation, then 
each man must suffer from the disease and bear the 
guilt of his own sin forever. But John testifies that 
this Lamb of God takes away sin. 

3. He announces the Catholicity of this great salva- 
tion: the Lamb of God is not a sacrifice for the sins 
of His people Israel alone, but for the sins of their 
Roman conquerors as well, and for the sins of the whole 
world, so that there shall never be a man anywhere, at 
any time, who may not have all his sins laid upon Jesus. 

4. He testifies to the pre-existence of Jesus. John 
the Baptist was born before Jesus. But he saw in 
Jesus not only his own superior but spiritual elder. He 
gives Him one of the Old Testament names for God 
(Isa. xliv., 6). He says of Jesus, "He was my First/' 
He anticipates the claim of Jesus, ' ' Before Abraham 
was, I am." 

5. He acknowledges Jesus as his prince. He had 
come simply to be usher to Jesus. His baptism existed 
that that function might be discharged, namely, that he 
might have divine assurance that this was the Lamb of 
God, and that he might exhibit Him as such to the 
people. John the Baptist had months before stated 
that He, "that Light," had come, but that he could 
not see Him. But now when Jesus had come down out 
of the great temptation and John saw Him, he said: 
" This is He." 

AN IMPRESSIVE NARRATIVE. 

This whole narrative deserves study. The solemn 
stateliness with which the affair marches on is most 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 23 

impressive. There is first the Incarnation, the silent 
coming of God into human flesh, moving nothing except 
the heart of one woman and that of her betrothed ; 
and then angels appear at the birth-night, so spiritu- 
ally powerful as to draw men from the East, yet making 
no stir at Jerusalem or in Eome, at the religious or at 
the political center of the world; and then thirty years 
of quiet life, a life which makes no more sensation in 
the world than that of any other very religious child of 
a religious peasant's family; and then the quiet, unin- 
vited coming of Jesus into the great crowd that 
thronged about John's baptism, a coming which made a 
lull in the noise of an excited multitude; and then the 
descending of a dove upon Jesus, which made John 
know that this was He who was to administer the bap- 
tism of the Holy Ghost; and then the quiet departure 
of Jesus, without a word of experience, or exhortation, 
or adieu; and then his absence for six weeks from the 
field of human observation, a period of quiet but pro- 
found perplexity to the Baptist; and then his quiet, word- 
less reappearance, when there was borne in upon John the 
divine assurance that this was the Lamb of God ; all is 
so wonderfully solemn, steady, and stately in its pro- 
gress. Fixing his steadfast gaze on Jesus, with simple 
fervor John said, "See: the Lamb of God that taketh 
away the sins of the world; this is He of whom I bare 
witness in general that He should come; but even when 
I felt like declining to baptize Him, I did not know 
Him; even when the dove descended on Him, I did not 
know Him ; but now I know that this is verily He/' 
The Baptist seemed to be soliloquizing. His disciples 
looked first at him and then at Jesus, who was quietly 



24 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

moving away. But next day, when Jesus again 
silently passed before them, the great teacher repeated 
his impressive words, apparently addressing them dis- 
tinctly to his disciples, "Behold God's Lamb." 

DISCIPLES COMING. 

This made a movement among his disciples ; but it 
was not a great movement. Here, as generally at great 
revival meetings, two out of thousands ; but those two 
are worth all the outlay of the revival. Two left John 
the Baptist and went towards Jesus. John's noon had 
passed. It was the beginning of his decline and the 
decline of Judaism, as it was the dawn of the ministry 
of Jesus and the initiation of Christianity. 

Only two. One is named, the other is not. One was 
Andrew ; we are sure that the other was John, the writer 
of this Evangely, brother of James and son of Zebedee. 
(1. ) There is no reason to suppress the name if it was any 
other than that of the writer, any more than to suppress 
that of Andrew. (2.) The account of this transaction 
is too minute and vivid to be made by any other than an 
eye-witness. (3.) His well-known custom was to sup- 
press his own name. And he does not even mention his 
brother James in all his gospel. (4.) Without this as- 
sumption we can not find a place for the entrance of John 
into the Christian society. 

Of Andrew we do not know very much. He may 
have had a Hebrew name, but the name Andrew in 
Greek means "manly. - " "He may have been a Grecian 
on his mother's side, a conjecture, perhaps, favored by 
the circumstances of his introducing to Jesus certain 
Grecians who desired to see the Great Master (John 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 25 

xii., 22). His position in the New Testament history is 
not nearly so important as that of his brother Peter ; 
but the few glimpses we catch of him show the eager 
spirit of one anxious for the spiritual welfare of others, 
and who has a simple, manly trust in his great spiritual 
Leader. He is mentioned with three other disciples as 
being in a confidential interview with Jesus, making in- 
quiries concerning the destruction of the holy city (Mark 
xiii., 3). He also appears in connection with the history 
of the feeding of the five thousand (John xv., 9). Be- 
yond this there appears no reference to Andrew." (See 
my book " The Light of the Nations," a rational in- 
quiry into the Memorabilia of Jesus, pp. 221, 222.) 

HOW THEY CAME. 
We are told that these two men "followed Jesus" — 
probably walked behind Him modestly, at some little 
distance, but eagerly. It was the beginning of His fol- 
lowing. We can fancy Jesus, weak from the terrific 
struggle of the Temptation after the exciting scene at 
the Baptism, now walking slowly away and musing on 
His unique position. We are never to lose the human 
Jesus in the divine Christ, nor the divine Christ in the 
human Jesus. "Is it not now to begin ? " we may 
fancy Him musing. " Am I to have no following from 
that great multitude ? " Then He became conscious of 
the nearness of the two men. He " turned " toward them 
as He always did and always does to sincere seekers, how- 
ever poor, or weak, or ignorant. Then He spake to them. 

FIRST WORD OF THE CHRIST'S MINISTRY. 
This came as the first word in the public ministry of 
Jesus : " What seek ye? " To the men walking along 



26 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL IJSTSIGHT. 

the Jordan-bank the deep significance of the question 
may not have been perceived at first. Indeed, every thing 
depends upon the look and tone of the questioner. 
Jesus might have repelled them forever by His manner. 
He might have implied that their following was an in- 
trusion, that He did not care to have His footsteps dogged, 
and that they should " go about their business." But 
we see from the narrative a very different light in the 
eye of Jesus, and we hear a very different tone in His 
voice. 

" What seek ye f" That is the preliminary, penetrat- 
ing, paramount question for all persons and at all times. 
The true answer to it will reveal to any man his real 
character and the trend of his whole life. " What am I 
seeking in life ? " That must be my first question for 
myself, as it is the first question of Jesus to me. Every 
morning and night, in every visit, trade, occupation, that 
is the question with which I must probe myself. What 
am I seeking above all things in writing this book ? 
What are you seeking in reading it ? What are you 
seeking in your business ? What was I seeking when I 
went to Church last Sunday ? " What 9 " Mark, Jesus 
does not say " whom?" What are men expecting to 
find in Jesus ? 

THE SECOND WORD. 

The suddenness of the question seemed to increase the 
embarrassment of Andrew and John. But embarrassed 
men often more readily blurt out the truth. One of them 
answered, " Rabbi, where dwellest Thou?" Their very 
reply shows that the question of Jesus had been uttered 
kindly. Every true minister of religion delights in 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 27 

being sought. His feeling is that if any man wants to 
see Mm he wants to see that man. But the sanctity and 
reputation of the teacher of truth may be an embarrass- 
ment to the seeker after truth. The two men in this 
case spoke out the truth. They sought Him. The title 
"Rabbi" with which they addressed him shows that 
they sought Him as a teacher ; they desired to enter His 
school and be permanently under His instruction. And 
so they asked His address. His first word of reply was 
" Come." It was condescension, and kindness, and 
hospitality, and the offer of friendship. It was like God; 
it was like Jesus. " Come, only come and ye shall see," 
was the confident promise of the Great Teacher. 

WHAT IS "A CHURCH"? 

In some little hut He had procured, or in the booth 
of some friend who was attending this Baptist camp- 
meeting, down there by the Jordan, was the first meet- 
ing which ever assembled of persons who were to 
be Christians. Any two people who come together in 
the name of the Lord constitute a church, because there 
are then always three present, one being Jesus ; and 
where Jesus and two of His followers are, there is a 
church. The old proverb Tres faciunt ecclesiam, " Three 
make a church," is always true when one of the three is 
Jesus : not "a church" in the sense in which modern 
ecclesiastics use the word, but in the New Testament 
sense of Jesus and the Apostles, namely, an assembly 
of believers, organized or unorganized. 

What was said by Teacher and disciples at that after- 
noon meeting no man can know. But it was a crisis in 
the spiritual lives of the two men and of the world. It 



28 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

began a new life in John. He never forgot the day nor 
the hour. Years and years after, when Jerusalem had 
been destroyed and Peter and Paul had died, John put 
on record that that wonderful meeting was about four 
o'clock in the afternoon. The result we know. All their 
lives these men had been looking for the Messiah, the 
Anointed of God, to take away the sins of their people ; 
and now they had found Him. The story has been 
told of a Greek mathematician that he had long been 
seeking to construct the demonstration of a geometrical 
proposition. It occurred to him while in the bath. 
Forgetful of his nude condition, he was so overjoyed 
that he rushed into the street shouting, " Eureka! Eure- 
ka ! " I have found it ! So, in the ecstacy of his joy 
ran Andrew to his brother Simon, a very rough speci- 
men of a Galilean fisherman, and shouted out to him, 
"We have found the Messias \" It was the rapture of 
a fresh and thorough conversion. It was irresistible. It 
"took him to Jesus." Andrew's first and early return 
to his Master was with a new convert, and that convert 
was his own brother. 

The work was begun. Three wonderful days had 
been passed. On the first John the Baptist had borne 
his general testimony to the character of the Coming 
One. The second day he had applied that declaration 
specifically and concretely to Jesus, who had now arrived. 
On the third day he repeated the testimony, and it bore 
fruit in opening the ministry of Jesus and forming the 
first band of discipleship. Then Jesus started towards 
Galilee and found Philip and Nathanael, thus enlarging 
that little company and changing the whole character and 
destiny of our humanity. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 29 



PRACTICAL LESSONS FROM THIS HISTORY. 

There are some practical lessons to be gathered in this 
late age of the Church from the history of the beginning 
of discipleship. 

1. The value of testimony. So much reliance is now 
placed upon argument. We must prove every thing. But 
as religion is a thing of fact and experience we can not 
prove it by logical processes. All that is worth any 
thing in this department is testimony. If I am sick and 
my friend has had the same sickness, all I care to know 
is : (1) that he is now well, and (2) who has cured him. 
My friend may be the most learned man in the world, or 
the plainest of simple men, and may spend hours in 
describing the medicine and in showing me how it will 
act on the bodily organs, or in eulogizing its curative 
qualities : it will all be of no avail to me. Are you now 
well ? Who cured you ? Those are the only questions I 
care to have answered. It is so in religion. We desire to 
know that a man whose life was an eruption of sin is now 
in sweet and perfect spiritual health. " I was blind, but 
now I see. A man called Jesus did what opened my 
eyes " : that is worth a thousand volumes on optics and 
materia medica. John testified, " There is the Lamb of 
God that taketh away the sins of the world " ; and that 
won Andrew. Andrew testified, "We have found the 
Messias " ; and that won Peter. The testimony was per- 
sonal and direct, and therefore convincing. 

2. In propagating the discijrieship of Jesus, it is to 
be observed that while the greater often leads the less, it 
very often is the case that the less converts the greater. 
John was undoubtedly superior to his brother James, but 



30 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

Andrew never took so high a position as his brother 
Peter. It is not the number of talents but the industri- 
ous use of them which is productive of good. In re- 
ligious propagandising above all things is character. The 
reality of the spiritual change and the sincerity of the 
witness to that change are indispensable for winning 
men to Christ. 

3. We have here another example of the value of small 
meetings. In modern times we lay such stress on mass- 
ing people together, on crowds, on great gatherings, and 
all that kind of thing. But what a study the " small 
meetings " of the Bible would make : Noah and his fam- 
ily in the ark ; God and Moses on Horeb ; the three " He- 
brew children " in the fiery furnace ; the prophet and his 
servant on the mountain ; the angel and Mary at the an- 
nunciation ; the little company at the Transfiguration ; 
Jesus and the woman at the well ; Paul and Silas in 
prison ; and this first church meeting of Christianity — 
what wonderful things have followed ! 

4. In the individual life, the main thing is to follow 
Jesus. We may learn all that the greatest prophets can 
teach us of Jesus, but if we do not follow Him until He 
speak to us we shall make no progress. If Andrew and 
John had not followed Jesus they would have been lost 
in the multitude of the unknown and unrecorded who 
remained to enjoy the spectacular scenes on the banks 
of the Jordan. It is practical action that brings knowl- 
edge. " Come," said Jesus, " and ye shall see." Move- 
ment, not musing, that is what is demanded. Andrew 
and John might have heard the voice of Jesus and stood 
where He addressed them and lost the profit and pleasure, 
the delight and the honor, of inaugurating the grand, long 



. THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 31 

line of Christian discipleship. "Come/' says Jesus. 
Let us go reverently up to the place where He dwells 
and stay there with Him. 

5. Every disciple is a missionary. Whoever truly finds 
Jesus has a desire to have others see Him. No energy 
should be lost in romancing. The convert in the far 
East need not have romantic ideas of crossing oceans and 
continents to convert the American Indian. Andrew 
heeded the testimony of John the Baptist and brought 
John the Evangelist to follow Jesus. When, from per- 
sonal interview, he was persuaded that this was the Mes- 
sias, he did not rush back to the Jordan, crowd or push up 
to Jerusalem to find his mission-field. He found his 
lr other, his own brother, and bore his testimony to him, 
and brought him to Jesus. That is our example. The 
unconverted man next to me is my field. And there is 
no time to be lost. 






ANDREW, THE FIRST DISCIPLE. 

Andrew begins at the nearest point — his own household. There 
is no postponement for a complete plan or for great occasions. 
His heart is full, and he does what he can. How soon this spirit 
in all His followers would bring the world to His feet ! 

— Bishop Huntingdon. 

So far as we know, Andrew lived but to utter that one sentence : 
"We have found the Christ."— S. Green, D.D. 

The apostle who occupies the first place in the Church's yearly 
festivals proves to have been one who sought not the first place for 
himself, and yet found it. He is always lost in another's bright- 
ness. He never puts himself prominently forward. Only once is 
he related to have spoken to our Lord, and then it was in dutiful 
reply to the question, "How many loaves have ye?" Another 
person is always found standing by his side, participating in his • 
privileges, halving his honors, sharing his joys. 

— Dean Burgot. 



III. 

Cfje prist's dFirst JSUtacle. 



John II. 

(1) And the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee ; 
and the mother of Jesus was there : (2) and Jesus also was bidden, 
and His disciples, to the marriage. (3) And when the wine failed, 
the mother of Jesus saith unto Him, " They have no wine." (4) 
Jesus saith unto her, " What [is that] to thee and to Me, woman ? 
Is not Mine hour yet come? " (5) His mother saith to the servants, 
' ' Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it" (6) Now there were six 
water-pots of stone set there after the Jews' manner of purifying, 
containing two or three firkins apiece. Jesus saith unto them, 
" Fill the water-pots with water." (7) And they filled them up to 
the brim. (8) And He saith unto them, "Draw out now, and bear 
unto the ruler of the feast." And they bare it. (9) And when the 
ruler of the feast tasted the water now become wine, and knew not 
whence it was {but the servants which had drawn the water knew), 
the ruler of the feast calleth the bridegroom, (10) and saith unto 
him, ' ' Every man setteth on first the good wine ; and when men 
have drunk freely, then that which is worse : thou hast kept the good 
wine until now. " This beginning of His miracles did Jesus in 
Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth His glory ; and His dis- 
ciples believed in Him. 



THE CHRIST'S FIRST MIRACLE. 

BACK TO NAZARETH. 

THE new little brotherhood recently formed at Beth- 
abara, on the Jordan, now moved in a body to- 
ward Galilee. Back to Nazareth went Jesus. A very 
important portion of His life had been spent in the two 
months of His absence from His home. He had been 
accredited as the Christ of God. He had fought His 
great battle with evil in the wilderness of the Tempta- 
tion. He had formed His first band of discipleship. 
He moved back to Galilee, accompanied by those disci- 
ples, namely : Andrew, John, and Peter, and perhaps 
Nathanael, and afterward Philip. 

It was a two days' journey to Nazareth. What con- 
versation the men had with their new Master we may all 
conjecture, but may never know. More and more, as 
they could bear it, Jesus let in on the spiritual eyes of 
His friends the light which was to prepare them for the 
ministry in which they were to be His assistants. It was 
a season in which they would become somewhat more 
intellectually and spiritually adjusted to this high com- 
panionship. They were on the eve of the first miracle 
of Jesus, which John relates. 

The particularity with which the minutiae of this 
event are mentioned renders it quite certain that the 
historian John was one of the party ; and that he, and 
Andrew, and Peter, and Philip went forward with their 



36 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

new Babbi, detaching themselves from John the Bap- 
tizer and attaching themselves to Jesus the Messiah. 
From Bethabara, on the Jordan, where the last incident 
is mentioned, to Cana in Galilee, there would be parts 
of three days consumed in the journeys Jesus would 
pass through Nazareth by the most natural route. Per- 
haps there He would be told that His mother had gone 
to Cana, to the wedding of some familiar friend of the 
family, and that an invitation had been left for Him, 
and any friend who might be with Him, to follow her as 
speedily as convenient. His friends continue with Him, 
and they go in a body to Cana. There an event in the 
life of Jesus occurs which make the most memorable 
wedding upon record. 

THE MOST CELEBRATED WEDDING. 

The marriage of no imperial party has been so fre- 
quently mentioned as this of these unknown peasants of 
Galilee. No wedding has evoked from genius so many 
poems and so many passages of eloquence. (" Light of 
the Nations," p. 121.) Indeed, for centuries no royal 
marriage has occurred in any capital of Christendom 
without attention to this extraordinary "marriage in 
Cana of Galilee," and more copies of accounts of this 
wedding-feast have been printed in more languages of 
the earth than that of any other wedding-feast which 
has been since the world began. Who the parties were 
we do not know. One of them may have been of the 
family of Alpheus, who resided in this Cana, a place 
which is not mentioned in the Old Testament, and is 
called Cana of Galilee to distinguish it from two other 
villages of Palestine of the same name. 



The Gospel of spiKiTiJAi, insight. 37 



THE GOING TO A PLEASURE PARTY. 

But these things are not very important. We are 
concerned with the main Personage in the group. It 
arrests our attention that He should be coming with the 
baptism of the Holy Ghost upon Him, returning from the 
long fast and the fearful spiritual conflict, and from the 
ministry of the ascetic John the Baptizer, who had come 
neither eating nor drinking ; and that His first move- 
ment should be social and His first visit be to a feast. 
But so it was. He never seemed holier than on this 
journey. Perhaps, except at the Last Supper, He was 
never more deeply engaged in spiritual exercises. And 
yet He went to " a party," a party of feasting and social 
pleasure. That is very shocking to the ideas of holiness 
held by not a few people. Indeed, do not most people 
regard a holy man as one who must not touch any enjoy- 
ment of life, but to throw it down, as one who could not 
be holy and healthy at the same time because health is 
such a pleasure ? Is it not generally held that dyspep- 
sia is essential to holiness ? Are not the saints all lean, 
meager, and cadaverous in their portraits ? But here is 
Jesus, Lord of the Saints, in the fullness of a ripe man- 
hood, in the most responsible position ever held by any 
man, and at a juncture of His history in which all the 
spiritual universe was profoundly interested, going off 
with His friends to a pleasure party ! We remind our- 
selves that, without performing any miracle, He had 
been building up His sanctity for thirty years, and was 
so holy that, without a word, the sight of Him had awed 
the awful John Baptist. Perhaps we have had wrong 
ideas of holiness. 



&S THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

Let us suppose that on reaching Nazareth Jesus re- 
ceived the message left by His mother and had commu- 
nicated it to His disciples. What would they think ? 
What would they do ? They were recent converts to the 
Holy Jesus from the ranks of the severe, austere, self- 
sacrificing John. " What would they do ?" Just what 
their Master did. It was too early in the work of Jesus 
for any of His followers to have reached such " advanced 
thought " and such "self -experience " as to say to their 
Master, " Well, go, if You can reconcile it to Your con- 
science ; but we are too young in the cause to be present 
at such frivolities." No ; they went with Jesus and had 
perhaps a whole morning's talk with Him about the affairs 
of the Kingdom during that walk of nearly four hours 
from Nazareth to Cana. 

Then came the miracle. 

JESUS THE GLORIFICATION OF NATURE. 

The run of John's gospel shows that this author had 
the insight to perceive that Jesus is the glorification of 
nature. As the incarnated Son of God He was the ripe, 
consummate flower of humanity. In His works He glo- 
rified that nature which had been lying around our hu- 
manity as a thing meaningless beyond its capability of 
satisfying our bodily wants. Jesus transfigured every- 
thing He touched, and John relates these miracles of 
such glorification, the first of which is this turning of 
water into wine. It is to be noted that this miracle was 
not performed in Athens, the center of civilization, nor 
in Rome, the center of power, nor in Jerusalem, the cen- 
ter of religion, nor before the immense crowds that 
thronged John at Jordan, but in a small circle of simple 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 39 

Galilean folk, in a little village in a remote part of an 
obscure province of the empire. The whole affair in all 
its essence and accessories is at the farthest possible re- 
move of every thing that suggests charlatanry. 

THE MOTHER OF JESUS. 

In the progress of the feast the mother of our Lord 
comes forward. She is called by John " the mother of 
Jesus," her name being suppressed, as is the custom with 
this author. But could a more beautiful, tender, and 
suggestive name be given to any woman than " the 
mother of Jesus" ? Not much parade of her is made in 
the Evangely. We have glimpses of her at the annun- 
ciation, at the visit to Elizabeth, at the birth of Jesus, 
in the Temple looking for Jesus, at this feast, and at the 
cross. But she held no official relation and took no fore- 
most place in the discipleship. She is not so prominent 
as that sweet and injured saint Mary of Magdala, who is 
mentioned just as often as the mother, who rendered 
more aid to the work of Jesus, and to whose dear eyes, 
and not to those of the mother, the risen Son of God first 
showed Himself after His resurrection. 

But here we have Mary " the mother of Jesus," and 
some indications of her characteristics. She approached 
her Son and said to Jesus, " They have not wine. " To un- 
derstand this announcement and what followed we must 
remember that Jesus and His disciples had been some 
time in the house, that John most probably had seen 
Mary, and that there had been ample time for conversa- 
tion. The theme dearest to Mary would be her Son. 
He had been growing in sanctity all these thirty years, 
and she was now half a century old ; and although she 



40 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

had had other children they had probably married and 
settled away from her while this holy celibate eldest child 
had remained to support and comfort her. The theme 
most absorbing to the disciples was what had happened 
at the baptism and at the simple inauguration of the new 
faith ; and they would tell her all that, and her confi- 
dence would grow rapidly ; and if they told her what 
Jesus Himself had said to Nathanael, who, by the way, 
resided in Oana, " Hereafter ye shall see heaven open and 
the angels of God ascending and descending upon the 
Son of Man," she might very rightfully have expected 
that now He would show forth the mighty power that re- 
sided in Him. 

THE MOTHER'S SPEECH TO HER SON. 

Now was the occasion. For some reason, undue pro- 
vision on the part of the entertainers or an unexpected 
accession of guests, the wine — the common beverage of 
the country — began to run low. It may have occurred 
to the mother that supplying a need, helping in straits, 
showing benevolence, would combine to make a motive 
for some intervention of the Son, so she approached 
Him and simply said, i ' They have not wine" — that is, wine 
enough to serve all the guests. 

The speech showed (1) her womanliness. She had 
reared a family. She had for thirty years been concerned 
with domestic matters. Much more quickly than a man 
would she perceive when there was about to arise any 
little household embarrassment. (2.) It shows her 
neighborliness. These people were her friends : they had 
undoubtedly interchanged civilities. They may have 
visited Mary's house. At any rate, there were kind re- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 41 

lations between their family and hers, so much that we 
may suppose that Jesus was acquainted with some mem- 
bers of the family He was now visiting. Neighbors can 
show unpurchasable kindness to neighbors. In emer- 
gencies like this neighborly help should be afforded. 
(3.) It shows her motherliness. She did not go to any 
other of the men at the feast. She went to her ever- 
thoughtful, ever-considerate, ever-helpful Son. She be- 
believed from her former experience that He could do 
something, and recent events justified her in believing 
that He could do much. (4.) I venture the sugges- 
tion that it showed her religiousness. She believed in 
the God of the prophets, and believed that the power 
of that God had come upon her miraculously-conceived 
Son. We are never to forget that she never forgot that 
Jesus had come into the world as no other human child 
had ever been born, and that what had occurred in the 
last hundred hours must have greatly revived the solemn 
religiousness which had pervaded her being from the 
moment of the annunciation until she held her Divine 
Darling in her arms. And yet (5) it showed some in- 
discretion. If she was looking for miraculous help she 
might have felt quite sure that He who could and would 
perform a miracle would know what was needed and how 
the need was to be supplied. It was a moment of failure 
of spiritual insight upon the part of the simple, sweet, 
holy mother of our Lord. Nothing more. All she said 
was, " They have not wine ;" there is wine lacking. 

THE SON'S REPLY TO HIS MOTHER. 

As it stands in our common English version the reply 
of Jesus is not so plain. It is this : " W^man, what 



42 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

have I to do with thee ? Mine hour is not yet come." 
It would seem that even the reader, who knew nothing of 
Greek, must fancy that this is a bad translation ; and it 
is, perhaps, one of the very worst, inasmuch as it seems to 
convey nothing that is in the original, and it suggests 
what we do not find there. To the English ear it sounds 
coarse, enigmatical, repulsive. But it has none of those 
characteristics. The words are : " What to thee and Me, 
woman ? Has not My hour come ? " Let us put our- 
selves back by imagination into the very group, carrying 
with us all our present knowledge of the character as well 
as the history of the two who hold this conversation. 

In the first place, it is inconceivable that Jesus should 
ever be rude to any woman under any circumstances, 
least of all to the woman who had cared for His human 
infancy and for whose widowhood in advancing years He 
had cared. It is to be noted that He does not call her 
" mother," for reasons which will appear. But ' ' woman" 
was not in His time an address of reproach in any land. 
Dion Cassius represents the noble Augustus as saying 
with kindness to Egypt's splendid queen, Cleopatra, 
"Woman, keep a good heart." Other such examples 
are outside the Holy Scriptures. Elsewhere Jesus em- 
ployed the same mode of address to this same mother as 
when from the cross (John xix., 20) He said, "Woman, 
behold thy Son," and immediately said to John, " Be- 
hold thy mother." If He felt affection for His mother 
it must have been when He was dying. He showed that 
by making her His last earthly care. It may also be 
noticed that the last word of Jesus in His communica- 
tion with men was "mother," when He said to John 
"Behold thy mother." It is further to be noted that 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 43 

the first words uttered by Jesus after His resurrection, 
addressed to His dearest female friend, and spoken in 
utmost compassion was, "Woman, why weepest thou ?" 
Then the "woman" spoken to the mother at C ana's 
wedding-feast was not abrupt and uncivil. Indeed, but 
for the conventional artificiality of society the compre- 
hensive word " woman " would everywhere be a title of 
greater honor than the polite, discriminating "lady." 

Nor is the next word any thing but respectful. The 
equivalent is found in the Hebrew. Wherever used in 
Holy Scripture it always implies respect for the persons 
to whom it was addressed. Eead Josh, xxii., 24, Judges 
xi., 12, 2 Sam. xvi., 10, 1 Kings xvii., 18, 2 Kings iii., 13, 
Matthew viii., 29, and Mark i., 24. But it seems also to 
imply a rejection of the proposal, a denial of any thing 
in common on the subject under discussion between the 
interlocutors, or an intimation of difference in relation- 
ship. So here. 

AN IMPORTANT DISTINCTION. 

If Jesus saw in Mary a disposition to make an indis- 
creet use of motherly authority, what He said was a 
respectful dissent from any such assumption. It was 
not the first time that they had met in that attitude. 
When He was but twelve years of age Mary and Joseph 
had left Him in Jerusalem, and when they returned 
and found Him in the Temple, Mary said, " Son, why 
hast Thou dealt so with us ? Behold, Thy father and I 
have sought Thee sorrowing ! " The very suggestion 
that Joseph was His "father " aroused in the boy a new 
and powerful sentiment. He may have regarded the 
worthy carpenter as His father up to that point, but 



44 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 

when His mother seemed to claim paternity for Joseph, 
there rose up in Jesus a great feeling of holding a great 
position in the universe. Mary would never forget that 
wonderful expression which came from the Divine Boy's 
face as He said : " My father? Why, did you not know 
that I have heen here about my Father's business ? " That 
look came into His face again when Mary told of the 
failing wine. There was a tender reproach in the tone 
in which He said, " What is that to thee ? " As if He 
had said, " You dear woman, you allow even the little 
discomforts of your neighbors to harass you ; what 
responsibility have you in this case ? Do not fret/' 
And then there arose up in Him the feeling that He had 
reached a crisis in His career as He asked, " And what 
to me ? " There may have been a pause and look of 
profound meditation and the sweep of a majestic light 
over His countenance as He said, in deeply impassioned 
tones, and as if in soliloquy, (i Has not My hour come ? " 
He had never performed a miracle. The silly stories of 
His boyhood which come down to us, telling how He 
had made birds of dirt for the amusement of the chil- 
dren of Nazareth, and how at a sweep of His hands those 
birds took life and flew away, are very foolish stories. 
But the miracle-working power now first stirred within 
Jesus (vs. 11). 

HOW MARY RECEIVED IT. 

And Mary saw it and understood. She did not feel 
rebuked. She did not even feel repelled. She had no 
consciousness of having either said or done any thing 
improper. There was nothing in the words or looks or 
tones of Jesus that was not most respectful. To a most 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 45 

wretched translation we owe the screeds of nonsense 
written by the " fathers" (and their sons) about this in- 
terview. The words of Jesus were, " What to thee, and 
to Me ? Has not My hour come ? " His question to 
His mother may have suggested the question to Himself, 
and that may have stirred His consciousness and sug- 
gested His third question. And in His soul the answer 
to that question was that His Messianic hour had come. 
Mary's spiritual insight united with her maternal 
instincts to assure her that something great was about 
to be done. She seemed to have some authority in that 
house. She ordered the servants to do whatever He 
directed. That very injunction shows the growing 
faith of the human mother in the divine Son. 

WHAT JESUS DID. 

It was a religious household. According to the tradi- 
tionary Jewish ritual for domestic religious rites, there 
were placed in convenient position, probably in the court 
of the house, six water-pots, " after the manner of the 
purifying of the Jews" (Matt, xv., 2; Mark vii., 3). No 
estimate of the contents of these six jars is less than a 
hundred gallons. Jesus ordered them to be filled with 
water, and He was obeyed so strictly that they were filled 
to the brim. No more could be poured in. Then, with 
a delicate humility unknown to workers in magic, to 
charlatans, and to jugglers, He said to the servants : 
" Draw out now and bear to the ruler of the feast." He 
does not call to the servants and say, "See now what I 
have done. You will bear Me witness that it was water, 
and everybody will see that this is wine." How simple, 
how majestic, how godlike His behavior was ! 



46 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL IKSIGHT. 

How " godlike" ? Where have men painted any God 
like that ? Whatever may be said of the other portion 
of the Bible, the seventh and eighth verses of the second 
chapter of John's gospel must be of superhuman author- 
ship. There is no other way for accounting for their 
existence in literature. There is nothing in Homer or 
iEschylus, nothing in Dante or Milton, nothing in 
Shakespeare or Goethe, to suggest that the genius of 
any one of them, or of . all combined, could have pro- 
duced those sentences. If they were the production 
of the unaided genius of a Syrian peasant, then that 
Galilean fisherman has achieved what all the other poets 
have found to be the impossible. 

If this affair at Cana did not take place as recorded, 
then John saw a god in his vision, and in the simplest 
words has revealed that god to us. 

If it did take place it was a miracle, and nothing 
less and nothing more. Whether all the water was 
turned to wine before the servants began to carry it to 
the feasters, or in its passage to the "governor of the 
feast," or as the guests were drinking, we do not know ; 
nor is it a matter of the least importance that we should. 
It was a miracle. We do not need to explain any thing 
allowed to be a miracle. The only explanation of a mir- 
acle is that it was a miracle. 

PRACTICAL LESSONS. 

Let us learn some lessons : 

1. Although there is nothing to show that Jesus re- 
pelled or rebuked His mother, it is certain that He called 
her by a term of respect, and spoke to her words which 
seem to indicate that while she saw the situation with 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 47 

the eyes of a mother and a neighbor, He saw it with the 
eyes of Jehovah's Messiah. His whole behavior shows 
that, while men will always respect the mother of Jesus, 
she has no more place in His reign of grace than any 
other gracious woman. 

2. This narrative shows, as all other miracles of Jesus 
show, that He will never consent to use His divine 
power for any self-glorification or for the gratification 
of the curiosity of personal wishes of His friends. It is 
like God to supply human needs but not to gratify 
human whims. 

3. He will do what is necessary to establish the faith 
of His disciples ; but " His glory " is "manifested" by 
the faith of those who love Him and not by any mere 
objectless display of omnipotence. 

4. He has all power over nature. He can transfigure 
and transform without carrying any thing through its 
natural processes. Without soil or seed, or air or grape- 
fruit, He can produce wine. What we call "laws of 
nature " are merely expressions of the modes of the 
workings of Jesus, but He began to make the worlds be- 
fore there was any law of nature. He made nature. 
He is over nature. He is supernatural. He can be 
trusted to do all possible things. 

5. With all His power and holiness nothing in human 
affairs is too trivial for His attention. He taught the 
courtesies of life. He taught that holy men are not to 
fly from the pleasures of social life on account of the 
temptations therein, for that would be to do evil that 
good might come, an experiment which always fails. It 
would be the laziness which "refuses the bounty to save 
the labor of seeking the grace." 



48 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

6. He taught His disciples that a good man need 
never decline to go to the place where duty calls him 
because the tongue of slander may assail him. If the 
Son of God did what He did, knowing that it would 
cause Him to be called a wine-bibber, who am I that I 
should be so exquisitely sensitive about my reputation 
as to decline my social duties ? 

7. If celibacy as a rule were right, Jesus would not 
have gone to Canals ivedding-fe&st. There are positions 
in which good men may be placed, as Jesus was placed, 
which providentially demonstrates to them that they 
must not marry. But, in each individual case it must 
be God who commands the celibacy. It is criminal, 
under any circumstances, for any man to take a vow of 
celibacy. It is blasphemous, as it assumes the preroga- 
tive of God. 

8. It gives the highest possible sanction to marriage. 
If marriage were, as the living crazy Eussian novelist de- 
clares, a vile thing, and children born in marriage or born 
anyhow are the product of filth and vice, then Jesus 
would not have "adorned with His presence and first 
miracle " that marriage in Cana of Galilee. No, by His 
apostle He helps our spiritual insight by showing us that 
marriage sets forth the mystical union which is between 
Christ and His Church. It shows that a man and a 
woman may stand in such relation to each other that the 
husband is always ready to die for the wife as Jesus died 
for the Church, and the wife stands always in expecta- 
tion of the husband's coming, listening for no other 
footfall but His ; and the bride, the Church, is always 
looking for and hasting the coming of her Lord. 

9. In every thing this miracle helps us to see that the 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 49 

spiritual is the basis of the material, is the real sub- 
stance of the universe, and to be spiritually minded is to 
be looking at that which is unseen and eternal. This is 
delicately set forth in the poem of James Freeman 

• 

Clarke : 

Dear Friend, whose presence in the house, 

Whose gracious word benign, 
Could once at C ana's wedding-feast 

Turn water into wine, — 

Come, visit us, and when dull work 

Grows weary line on line, 
Revive our souls, and make us see 

Life's water glow as wine. 

Gay mirth shall deepen into joy, 

Earth's hopes shall glow divine, 
When Jesus visits us, to turn 

Life's water into wine. 

The social talk, the evening fire, 

The homely household shrine, 
Shall glow with angels' visits, when 

The Lord pours out the wine. 

For when self-seeking turns to love 

Which knows not mine and thine, 
The miracle again is wrought, 

And water changed to wine. 



That our Saviour's working a miracle when he was at the mar- 
riage-feast should teach us, by his example, that in our chearful 
and free times, when we indulge a little more than ordinary to 
mirth amongst our friends, we should still be mindful of God's 
honour and glory, and lay hold upon an occasion of doing all the 
good we can. As Christ was personally invited to, and bodily 
present at, this marriage-feast, when here on earth ; so he will not 
refuse now in heaven to be spiritually present at his people's mar- 
riages. They want his presence with them upon that great occa- 
sion ; they ( desire and seek it ; he is acquainted with it, and invited 
to it, whoever is neglected. And where Christ is made acquainted 
with the match, he will certainly make one at the marriage. 
Happy is that wedding where Christ and his friends are the in- 
vited, expected, and enjoyed guests. 

— W. Burkitt, A.M., 1780. 



IV. 



John III. 

(1) Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a 
ruler of the Jews : (2) the same came unto Him by night, and said 
to Him, ' 'Rabbi, we know that Thou art a teacher come from God : 
for no man can do these signs that Thou doest, except God be with 
him.' 1 '' (3) Jesus answered, and said unto him, "Verily, verily, I 
say unto thee, Except a man be born from above, he can not see the 
kingdom of God." (4) Nicodemus saith unto him, " How can a man 
be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's 
womb, and be born ?" (5) Jesus answered, " Verily, verily, I say 
unto thee, Except a man be born of water and the Spirit, he can 
not enter into the kingdom of God. (6) That which is born of the 
flesh is flesh ; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit" 



THE SECKET DISCIPLE. 

THE CHRIST'S INSIGHT INTO MAN. 

AFTER the miracle at the marriage in Cana of Galilee, 
. Jesus and His family and His school moved in a body- 
to Capernaum. The reasons for this movement are not 
given. Nor was the stay long. The Passover soon called 
them to Jerusalem, where Jesus drove the merchants out 
of the Temple. His acts and words increased the num- 
bers of those who believed on His name with that kind 
of belief which is the mere result of wonder at sudden 
exhibitions of power. But they had not so worked His 
principles into their character as to be willing to either 
live or die for Him. In the close of the second chapter 
of St. John's gospel it is recorded that Jesus did not be- 
lieve in them, did not treat them as perfectly trusted dis- 
ciples, because He knew all things. "He knew what 
was in man." 

When we see a man, ordinarily we simply receive on 
the retina of our eyes the figure produced by the man's 
phenomena ; sometimes we see more deeply and pene- 
trate somewhat into his character ; but when Jesus looked 
on a human being He saw that which was "in him/' 
that spirit which is the man himself. To Him the man's 
spirit was stark naked and visible. 

Immediately after this statement of Christ's insight, 
and as an illustrative case thereof, the record is given of 
one man, a semi-believer, whose interview with Jesus 



54 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

was of a most important character. His name is given. 
It was a Greek name, but common in Palestine in the 
days of Jesus. It was Nicodemus. It is observable that 
sometimes names are given in the Gospel history and 
sometimes omitted. We have Mary of Magdala, sweet 
saint, and we have a " certain" nameless woman who 
touched the hem of His garment and was made whole. 
Perhaps some one will find the clue to this discrimina- 
tion. There must be some reason ; there is nothing ac- 
cidental in the Bible. 

NICODEMUS. 

There is more than ordinary statement of subordinate 
facts in this man's case. His name is given. His sect 
is mentioned. He was a Pharisee. The Pharisees were 
the best of the sects. A Pharisee was much better than 
a materialistic Sadducee. As a Pharisee he was much 
more exacting, requiring his own life and that of those 
whom he would approve and with whom he would asso- 
ciate to be very near the standard of perfection in out- 
ward morality. So far did he carry this that he rested 
his hope of final salvation upon the conformity of his 
external life to the literal statements of the moral law. 
He prided himself, as Saul of Tarsus did, on his having 
been " taught according to the perfect manner of the 
law of the fathers." He was sanctimonious. He was 
scientific. He belonged to that class who were expected 
to examine every new candidate for popular favor, who 
acted only as they were expected to act when they went 
down to the Jordan to examine the claims of John the 
Baptist, when the fame of his preaching reached Jeru- 
salem. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 55 

His rank, also, is given. He was a member of the San- 
hedrim. He belonged to a body which united the func- 
tions and dignities of the Senate and Supreme Court of 
the United States, a body whose sanction was necessary 
to establish the position of any one who claimed to be 
prophet or teacher. The populace would not acknowl- 
edge any to be " the very Christ " until his claim had been 
allowed by " the rulers/' that is to say the Sanhedrim. 

This gentleman, this scholar, this ruler — none higher 
in Jerusalem — did a very unusual thing. He called on 
a young Peasant from Galilee who had made an uproar 
in the Temple and brought the Wall Street of Jerusalem 
down upon Him. The ruler did not send for the young 
Galilean that he might examine Him, but actually paid 
this rude, uneducated Preacher the compliment of a visit. 
Nicodemus was not a hypocrite. There is no just ground 
for supposing any sinister motive. He was a slow man 
of heavy temperament and judicial cast of mind, quite 
candid and fair. But he shared the feeling of the pop- 
ulace in being excited by the personality and deeds of 
this extraordinary young Prophet from Nazareth. The 
conviction must have forced itself very deeply and very 
strongly into his nature that here was a man whose case 
was worth his immediate investigation both as a man and 
as a Sanhedrist. 

HIS NIGHT VISIT TO THE CHRIST. 

So he came to Jesus. He came by night. Why ? It 
was not fear. That is not alleged in the history. There 
was nothing to fear. As a ruler he had a right to ex- 
amine this case. He might even have consulted other 
members of the Sanhedrim, as one of his phrases inti- 



56 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

mated he had done. There seems to have been every 
reason why he should have come by night. His official 
business must have been greatly increased during the 
Passover and would occupy his day; and during the day 
Jesus was in the Temple; night would give quiet for 
talk, and it was simply prudent that a man in his posi- 
tion should not make any intimation to the populace 
even of his examination of the case until prepared to 
announce a decision. But it is remarkable that when- 
ever the Nicodemus is mentioned by John it is always 
as the night-comer. So when he stood up for Jesus in 
the Sanhedrim (vii., 50), and so when he went out to 
take tender care of the body of the Lord after the cruci- 
fixion (xix., 39). 

He came just as he was; so in the Greek, "this man"; 
in the English common version, " the same." Men, 
even the strongest, can not surrender all prejudices at 
once nor at once break through all conventionalities. 
And no man need strive to make himself other than he 
is when coming to Jesus. Nicodemus probably found 
John present with Jesus. The narrative sounds like 
something related by a witness who had seen and heard. 
Nicodemus could not have related the conversation; and 
it is not probable that Jesus did. The report of the 
interview is vivid. 

PROMPT DISCOURSE. 

Nicodemus went right at it. There does not seem to 
have been any preliminary talk about the weather, or 
about exciting political subjects, or about Jerusalem gos- 
sip. The very opening of his speech shows a frank cau- 
tion. " Rabbi, we know that from God Thou hast come 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. - 57 

— a teacher." That is the precise order of the words he 
is reported to have uttered. As spoken by Nicodemus 
what does this mean? In the first place it is most 
courteous. To the appellation " Babbi" great respect 
was attached. It was given to no common teacher. It 
was a title most ardently sought by all who were engaged 
in teaching. ' ' We know " can be variously interpreted. 
It may have been carefully selected to shield the speaker 
from personal and special responsibility for the opinion 
he was about to utter. It was the formula which the 
proud Scribes were accustomed to employ when about to 
pronounce an opinion upon which they had agreed, dis- 
sent from which they regarded as equivalent to heresy. 
It certainly implies that others of his rank and office 
joined with him in what he was about to utter. One of 
them is known to us by name, Joseph of Arimathea. 
Perhaps Nicodemus was willing to imply that the whole 
Sanhedrim, down in their hearts, really believed what he 
was about to say, and that perhaps, if he should be able 
to report favorably of this interview, the whole body 
might be brought to an open admission of all that Jesus 
claimed. It certainly was a recognition of the lofty 
intellectual and moral qualities of Jesus by the class of 
his people who could speak with the highest authority 
in such matters. 

GREAT ADMISSIONS. 

It was an admission of His divine right. They knew that 
He had "come from God." That was a great conces- 
sion. If He had come from God they were obliged to give 
Him the attention to which such a divine embassador 
was entitled. 



58 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

Nicodemus spoke either in Hebrew or Aramaic. If 
he employed the word in either language which is the 
parallel to "come," it might be supposed to imply that 
they believed Jesus to be " the Coming One" and thus 
grant Him the honors of the Messiah. If open to that 
interpretation it was immediately withdrawn by the 
word which follows — "a teacher." That would be 
simply to admit that He was one of the teachers or 
prophets whom God sent into the world from time to 
time. The Messiah was not to be simply a teacher, but 
a king. And the apparent admission is further guarded 
by the assignment of a logical reason for their belief : 
"No man can do these miracles that Thou doest except 
God be with him." 

1. Then, we have the opinion of those most capable 
of forming an opinion and of the persons whose author- 
ity in these matters is most authoritative, that Jesus had 
a divine legation, which legation was attested, as was 
that of Moses, by the performance of miracles which 
could not be wrought without divine power. He is not 
simply indorsed as a miracle-worker. He might do mar- 
velous things by the aid of the devil, like those re- 
corded in the seventh chapter of Exodus. He would 
then be merely a magician. But we have now the cer- 
tification of the chief authority of the times and his 
country to the surpassing greatness and divine character 
of the miracles of Jesus. 

2. From what Nicodemus said we see that all that the 
Pharisees and the rulers felt they needed was a teacher, 
not a Saviour. That is also the difficulty of our modern 
times. It is believed that men can be saved by "cult- 
ure," the gospel of education being all that is needed ; 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 59 

whereas it is easy to show by a generalization from mul- 
titudes of instances that every man, woman, and child 
now in the human population of the world might be in- 
tellectually cultivated to the greatest height ever attained 
by any mortal, and yet earth be a very hell. The intel- 
lectual heresy of the time of Jesus is the intellectual 
heresy of the nineteenth century. 

3. We also see that the war made against Jesus to the 
bitter end of His crucifixion was waged by the Jews from 
hatred of His pure personality and against the conclu- 
sions of their own minds. And from that time to this 
the ablest antagonists of Jesus have always been hypo- 
crites, in the sense that they have acted against their 
convictions. The men of oiir age who blaspheme and 
would crucify Jesus would, if they were not such hypo- 
crites, acknowledge, ' ( We know that Thou art come from 
God." The moral crime of the time of Jesus is also the 
moral crime of the nineteenth centur}^. 

4. But what a fall there was in this introductory speech 
of Nicodemus ! He had come to talk about the kingdom 
of God, and he falls to mere science. He had come to 
learn something about the man who might be the King 
of the coming kingdom, and he drops to talk about a 
school ! The spiritual insight of Jesus saw Nicodemus 
through and through, and, waiving all that was said or 
implied by what he had spoken, Jesus anticipated the 
question which was in the soul of this really sincere 
seeker after truth, and plunged at once into the subject. 

JESUS DOGMATIC. 

Jesus was never more dogmatic. We can perhaps have 
an idea of His estimate of Nicodemus from His reply. To 



60 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

no man who was not honest could Jesus have made such 
a speech as He addressed to Nicodemus. Whatever 
may have been his frailties of character or tempera- 
ment, into whatever confusion of thought he may have 
fallen in regard to teacher, prophet, and Messiah, as his 
speech showed, — great confusion for a man who generally 
thought so clearly, — manifestly Jesus supposed that this 
man, who seemed to be a mere rationalist, giving rea- 
sons for believing instead of surrendering his life to the 
truth, this Nicodemus, at the bottom of his heart, 
really desired to be a loyal subject of the kingdom of 
God. Therefore did the mysterious young Prophet ad- 
dress to him most respectfully a statement of the 
indispensable qualification for such citizenship, the very 
thing which Mcodemus most wished to know. It is to 
be noticed that He did not first attempt to overthrow the 
errors of Nicodemus, or to clear the fog from his nature. 
Jesus knew that the entrance of the light of truth would 
scatter all darkness. "With a look which Mcodemus 
must have felt searching him to the core of his existence 
Jesus said : " Verily, verily, 1 say unto thee, except a 
man be born from above he can not see the kingdom of 
God" Let us analyze this sentence. 

1. It was addressed to the reason and the heart of 
Nicodemus. If Jesus was "from God" He could 
speak with authority. To the opinion of the San- 
hedrim He could, and did, oppose His single voice 
unsupported and needing no support. They said, " We 
know ; " He said, "I say." They expressed their opin- 
ion as the product of a course of reasoning ; He made 
His utterance as the expression of paramount author- 
ity. There might be appeal from their opinions ; 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 61 

there is none from His authority. What they said was 
human and might be challenged ; what He said was 
divine, and was to be received without question. All one 
has to do is simply to learn what it means. 

2. The sentence is very positively introduced by the 
formula, "Verily, verily/' The words about to be 
uttered were not a theme for a debate ; they were God's 
final thought on the subject. They did not concern 
trivial and temporary matters, but struck their roots 
into the depths of humanity and divinity and eternity ; 
therefore, the preface is most solemn, "Verily, verily, I 
say." 

3. He makes this great truth of concern to each indi- 
vidual man. That is Christ's manner. Other teachers 
set forth general truths. Jesus individualizes and does 
not commingle. Other teachers fail of success because 
they are striving to promote the good of the individual by 
promoting the general weal — a plan which has always 
failed, and in the nature of things must always fail. 
Jesus reaches the commonwealth by advancing each 
individual — a plan which, in the nature of things, must 
always succeed, because, as one reason, each individual 
stands in himself, while the community, the family, the 
municipality, or the State, does not stand in itself, but 
stands in the individual. There may be the individual 
without the community, but not the community without 
the individual. " I say unto thee" 

4. And then the terms of individual citizenship are 
common to all and indispensable for each : there is no 
entering the kingdom for any man which is not neces- 
sary for every man. "Except a man be born from 
above he can not see the kingdom of God/' must 



62 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

mean that no man can see that kingdom who has 
not had that experience. High-priest, Sanhedrist, 
Pharisee, Scribe, must go through precisely the same 
process necessary for Gentile, pagan, and the heathen 
proselyte. This must have been a sharp saying for 
Nicodemus, as it is for any gentleman of our own age, 
to be told that the same process must occur in the history 
of Senator and president of the university as in that of 
the degraded prostitute and the cunning wharf -rat. But 
it is so. Culture of the intellect has nothing to do with 
it. It is not an affair of the intellect, but of the spirit. 
Jesus rides over the " teacher " allusion in the speech of 
Nicodemus. It is as if He had said : It is not a new 
doctrine men want, but a new life ; it is not a question 
of doing something but of being something ; a foreigner 
might do all that a citizen does and yet not be a citizen. 
Perhaps Luther puts it still better, thus : " My teaching 
is not of doing or leaving undone, but of a change in the 
man ; it is not new works done but a new man to do 
them ; not another mode of living only, but a new 
birth." 

5. There is an assumption in the speech of Jesus 
which He did not discuss, which needed no discussion, 
because Nicodemus felt it, and by his visit acknowl- 
edged it, namely, the absolute necessity of being in 
the kingdom of God. And under that is the assump- 
tion that there is a kingdom, "a, government in which 
God is King, which, being an abstraction, we can con- 
cretely think of so far as each man is concerned only as 
the surrender of that man to the rule of God, the total 
removal of rebellion out of his heart, the destruction of 
the principle and spirit of rebellion from his soul, so 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 63 

that lie is loyal to Gk>d freely and affectionately " (See 
my " Light of the Nations.") To the forming of just 
such a body on earth Jesus devoted His life. But He 
made no concessions ; for 

6. He announced to Nicodemus that the only way of 
entrance into that kingdom was by birth ; that no man 
could move in, no foreigner be naturalized ; but wher- 
ever a citizen of that kingdom can be found he must 
have been born into citizenship. Nicodemus had come 
to Jesus as to a teacher, expecting to be taught, schooled 
into the kingdom, whereas Jesus had peremptorily and 
dogmatically and solemnly declared, ' e Except a man be 
born from above he can not see the kingdom of God," 
much less can he be in it. 

7. Jesus anticipated that scientific doctrine of the 
nineteenth century which we call biogenesis, that every 
living thing comes from some other living thing out- 
side itself, and that there is no such thing in nature 
as spontaneous generation. In the case of the spirit- 
ual life there is no evolution, there is no develop- 
ment, there is strictly no regeneration, any more than 
when life seizes inorganic matter and produces a vegeta- 
ble or an animal organism. It is a birth from above. 
Something has descended upon dead matter and it has 
flowered into a rose or leaped into a lamb. Education 
brings out what is in a man ; religion puts into a man 
that which he can never have from nature. 

A STARTLED PHILOSOPHER. 

Nicodemus felt the rebuke, coming as it did so 
sharply from so young and uneducated a man to one so 
much older and believing himself so much more learned. 



64 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 



His reply, "How can a man be born when he is old ?" 
perhaps does not necessarily show that he had misunder- 
stood Jesus, as has generally been supposed. It may 
mean an attempt to refute the young Prophet. It may 
be equivalent to saying, You know the difficulty of 
causing an aged body to repeat its birth; and it must be 
more difficult in the case of the spirit. He did not believe 
Jesus; perhaps that was all; and he tried to show Jesus 
that He was mistaken. 



THE PROFOUND REPLY OF JESUS. 

The reply which Jesus made was preceded by that sol- 
emn, " Verily, verily. " He had announced the necessity 
of the new birth; He now states how it comes about. 
" Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he 
can not enter the kingdom of God." This reply to Nic- 
odemus's reductio ad absurdum is the statement of a 
well-known principle in physiology and psychology, that 
that which begets imparts its nature to that which is 
begotten. If a man could go into his mother's womb 
and be born again he would be born the same, and noth- 
ing would come of the process, even if repeated a 
thousand times; but if the Spirit of the Almighty God 
make a new spiritual creation there is no longer any dif- 
ficulty to be objected. There is no regeneration; there 
is a new generation. 

" Of water and the Spirit." With the prepossessions 
of almost all Christians baptism is suggested by " water" 
in this phrase. Certainly both Nicodemus and Jesus 
were familiar with baptism, a ceremony by which a 
heathen proselyted to Judaism publicly put off his old 
belief and put on the new faith. But Jesus could not 



THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 65 

have meant that, especially as applying to John's bap- 
tism, and thus made spiritual regeneration depend upon 
a ceremony practiced by His now superseded forerunner. 
Moreover, in many modern churches the rite of baptism 
is administered only to those who are believed to have 
the experience of the new birth. After all, is there any 
allusion to baptism ? Is physical water meant ? If so, 
why not physical "wind"? Strictly translated, the 
phrase is, "If any one has not been born of water and 
wind he can not enter the kingdom of God." Now to 
take these words as pointing only to material "water" 
and material "wind" is absurd. If the long line of 
scholarly and devout thinkers through the Christian 
ages have been justified in interpreting the word 
"wind" to mean the Spirit of God, seeing that Jesus 
was speaking of spiritual things, why should we not be 
justified in interpreting "water" to mean the word of 
God? We know from other Scripture that the new 
birth is produced by the voice and Spirit of God. James 
says (v., 18), "Of His own will begat us with the word 
of truth;" Peter, in his First Epistle (i., 23), "Being 
bom again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, 
by the word of God." Very plainly in these words the 
word is set forth as the instrument of salvation, as it is 
also in our Lord's great prayer: " Sanctify them through 
Thy truth; Thy word is truth " (John xvii., 17). Here 
plainly it is the word and the Spirit; so when the for- 
mula is " the water and the Spirit," then we may suppose 
it possible that "the water " stands for " the word," and 
this is rendered probable by the passage in the Epis- 
tle to the Ephesians (v., 25, 26): "Christ loved 
the Church and gave Himself for it; that He might 



66 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITtJAL INSIGHT. 



sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of the water in 
the word. " 

When a man believes in Christ a new life is born 
within him. It is not the old life improved. " That 
which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is 
born of the Spirit is spirit." 



V. 
STije Samaritan ffloimert. 



John IV. 

(5) So He cometh to a city of Samaria, called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground 
that Jacob gave to his son Joseph : (6) and Jacob's well was there. Jesus there- 
fore, being wearied with His journey, sat thus by the well. It was about the sixth 
hour. (7) There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water : Jesus saith unto 
her, '■'Give Me to drink.' 1 '' (8) For His disciples were gone away into the city to 
buy food. (9) The Samaritan woman therefore saith unto Him, " How is it that 
Thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a Samaritan woman f " (For 
Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) (10) Jesus answered and said unto her, 
" If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give Me to 
drink ; thou wouldest have asked of Him, and He would have given thee living 
water." (11) The woman saith unto Him, "Sir, Thou hast nothing to draw 
with, and the well is deep ; from whence then hast Thou that living water ? (12) 
Art Thou greater than our father Jacob, which gave us the well, and drank 
thereof himself, and his sons, and his cattle ? " (13) Jesus answered and said 
unto her, "Every one that drinketh of this water shall thirst again: (14) but 
whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the 
water that I shall give him shall become in him a well of water springina up unto 
eternal life.'''' (15) The woman saith unto Him, " Sir, give me this water, that 
I thirst not, neither come all the way hither to draw." (16) Jesus saith unto her, 
" Go, call thy husband, and come hither." (17) The woman answered and said 
unto Him, 4 ' i" have no husband. ' ' Jesus saith unto her, ' ' Thou saidst well, I have 
no husband ; (18) for thou hast had five husbands ; and he whom thou now hast 
is not thy husband ; this hast thou said truly." (19) The woman saith unto Him, 
" Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. (20) Our fathers worshiped in this 
mountain ; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to wor- 
ship." (21) Jesus saith unto her, " Woman, believe Me, the hour cometh, when 
neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, shall ye worship tlie Father. (22) Ye 
worship that which ye know not : we worship that which we know : for salvation 
is from the Jews. (23) But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worship- 
ers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth : for such doth the Father seek 
to be His worshipers. (24) God is spirit : and they that worship Him must wor- 
ship in spirit and truth." (25) The woman saith unto Him, " I know that Mes- 
siah cometh (which is called Christ) : when He is come, He will declare unto us all 
things." (26) Jesus saith unto her, " I that speak unto thee am He." 



THE SAMARITAN CONVERT. 
FLYING FROM POPULARITY. 

JESUS made a flight from popularity. John's testi- 
mony and His own character and teaching had 
won Him a great following. Early popularity is some- 
times injurious to a great life scheme. It threatened to 
be so in His case. So Jesus fled again to Galilee. There 
were two routes: the one circuitous to the east of the 
Jordan, the other direct, leading through Samaria. He 
chose the latter. 

JEWS AND SAMARITANS. 

There is no literature in which the hatred between the 
Jews and the Samaritans is not proverbial. It arose in 
this way: In the eighth century before Christ the tribes 
of Israel had been carried away captive by Shalmanezer 
to Assyria. This left their town and region waste, and 
they remained so until another Assyrian king brought 
men from different places in Mesopotamia and planted 
them in the land. ' This was probably more than a hun- 
dred years after the captivity had begun. Perhaps it 
was Esarhaddon, as the Samaritan legend claimed. On 
his invasion of Judah, B.C. 677, he may have seen the 
beauty Of this waste country and determined to repopu- 
late it. This un- Jewish population were not descendants 
of Jacob, as some of them subsequently claimed. They 
had a mixed faith: they " feared Jehovah and served 
graven images" (2 Kings xvii.). 



70 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

After Judah's return from the captivity it is very 
probable that some of the families intermarried with this 
foreign idolatrous nation. *At any rate some of them 
desired to assist at the rebuilding of the Temple at Jeru- 
salem, and the offer was declined. This incensed the 
Samaritans, who harassed the Jews for more than a 
hundred years, until the interference of Darius Hystas- 
pes (519 B.C.). This did allay the bitterness for a sea- 
son, but the hatred grew with the years. B.C. 409, Man- 
asseh, a man of the sacerdotal order, having contracted 
an unlawful marriage with the daughter of Sanballat, 
the Persian satrap, was expelled therefor from Jerusalem 
by Nehemiah, upon which he obtained permission from 
Darius Nothus, the king of Persia, to erect a temple on 
Mount Gerizim for the Samaritans, who had afforded 
him an asylum. This was all that had been lacking to 
make the hatred between the races intense. The schis- 
matic, heretical Samaritans did all in their power to 
harass the Jews, who repaid their ill-treatment with 
indescribable hate. Josephus says that the Samaritans 
would waylay the Jews on their journey to the Temple, 
so that many from the northern portion of the land were 
compelled to make a long detour east of the Jordan for 
fear of their enemies. It was so intolerable at one time 
as to lead to an armed conflict. Josephus also tells a 
horrible story of Samaritans stealthily entering the 
Temple after midnight and scattering dead men's bones 
in the cloisters. 

We are told that the Jews were accustomed to com- 
municate to their brethren in Babylon the exact time of 
the rising of the paschal moou, by beacon-fires began on 
Mount Olivet, and " flashing from hill to hill until they 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 71 

were mirrored in the Euphrates." The Samaritans fre- 
quently deceived and disappointed those whose lamps 
were hanging on the willows over the waters of Babylon 
by perplexing the watchers on the mountains by a rival 
flame. Josephus loses no occasion to tell us of Samari- 
tan meanness and outrage, and there is no reason to dis- 
believe any of his statements; and if we had a Samaritan 
historian we should undoubtedly hear quite as much 
that was quite as true and bad on the other side. We 
know that the Samaritan was publicly cursed in the 
synagogues of the Jews; that he could not appear as a 
witness in a Jewish court; that what he touched was 
considered as swine's flesh; and that no penitence or 
profession of faith upon his part would admit him 
through any door of proselytism, the Jew striving thus 
to cut ' him off from the hope of eternal salvation. 
"Thou art a Samaritan and hast a devil," was the ordi- 
nary Jewish form for expressing utter contempt of any 
one. 

The violence of this hatred was thus expressed: "He 
who receives a Samaritan into his house, and entertains 
him, deserves to have his own children driven into 
exile." (" Light of the Nations," pp. 151, 152.) 

THE WELL OF JACOB. 

Very beautiful is the situation of the city of Shechem 
in Samaria. The mountains of Ehal and Gerizim are 
parallel, and between them there is a beautiful valley slop- 
ing up toward the west. When the writer of this vol- 
ume saw it, it was as the sun was descending between 
the mountains and flooding the whole valley with a 
stream of light which seemed to roll over the town. 



72 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

Eastward of the two mounts, a half -hour's ride from the 
town, is the well of Jacob, near which is Joseph's tomb. 
Upon reaching this spot at midday Jesus was wearied 
and rested on the curb while the disciples went into the 
town to procure food. A Jew might not accept food as 
a present from a Samaritan, but he might purchase of 
him. Their absence was necessarily at least three quar- 
ters of an hour. It was probably longer. The disciples 
had probably also taken the portable little household 
apparatus of the company, with which would be the 
antlema, the pole to which buckets were attached to be 
let down into wells. Tired and thirsty, Jesus saw a 
woman approach. What would a woman of the city 
want at the well at this hour? She did not have to 
come from the heart of the town for water, as there were 
wells in Shechem. When this difficulty was presented 
by me to a learned man in Shechem (now Nablous, cor- 
rupted from Neapolis), he said that women of the town 
at certain seasons of the year were accustomed to hire 
themselves to work in the fields at the bottom of the 
valley, and would go provided with poles to let their 
pitchers into the well, which it was very natural that 
they should frequent at midday. 

THE WOMAN OF SAMARIA. 

Jesus lost no opportunity to promote the cause for 
which He had come into the world. Man or woman, 
many or few, made no difference with Him. A human 
spirit was of sufficient value and interest to draw forth 
the treasures of His grace and wisdom. As soon as the 
woman came near the well He opened the conversation, 
and it is worthy of remark that John's report of that con- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 73 

versation is longer than the account given of Christ's 
talks with John Baptist, or the priests, or Moses and 
Elias, or Nicodemus, although there were three things 
to disparage her in the eyes of a Jew, two in the eyes of 
any oriental, and one in the eyes of any man of any land 
and any age, as it turned out that this person was a 
woman, a Samaritan, and a prostitute. 

It is remarkable that there should be a prejudice 
against woman anywhere, and especially among orientals, 
and more especially among Jews, since God has chosen 
women rather than men through whom to make His 
revelations to the world. To Eve He made that promise 
of a Saviour which kept the world in heart until Jesus 
came ; to the Mother Mary He made the announcement 
of the approaching birth of the World's Deliverer, and 
His only mortal parent was a woman ; to this woman, 
at Jacob's well, He made the first open declaration of the 
presence of the Messiah; and to the blessed saint, Mary 
of Magdala, He announced that Resurrection which is 
the corner-stone of the religion which is the world's 
asylum. It was natural that a Jew should hate a 
Samaritan. It is natural that the male sex should dis- 
like a prostitute, as she is the product of the lust of men, 
and we always hate those whom we have injured. Here, 
then, were three prejudices to overcome, that of sex, that 
of nationality, and that of character and station. 

THE METHODS OF THE CHRIST. 

The methods of Jesus in bringing a soul to spiritual 
light and life are worthy of study. The most obvious 
thing in this narrative is the naturalness of Jesus. He 
is simply a man. There is nothing of the pedagogue or 



H THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

lecturer or preacher about Him. He meets His auditor 
as an unofficial man would meet a wholly indifferent 
woman. Yet through the whole conversation His dig- 
nity impresses us as no self-conscious dignity could. 
His spiritual insight is surprising. His delicacy is as 
sweet as the greatness of such a man could make it. 
And His spiritual earnestness is a tonic to all students 
of this scene. 

He opened the interview as He sat by the ledge or on 
the curb of the well, which was a spring well, a fact to 
be noticed as coloring the discourse. The woman prob- 
ably had brought up water for herself, and taken a 
draught without paying the least attention to the travel- 
ing Jew, when Jesus simply said, " Permit Me to drink." 
To make a request of another is always a compliment. 
It was very natural to take " water" for the text of this 
discourse. The examination of the Scriptural uses of 
water would be very profitable if we had space, but we 
are now confined to this conversation. The request of 
Jesus brought out the woman's characteristics. 

THE WOMAN'S CHARACTERISTICS. 

She perceived by His accent, if not by His dress and 
address, that He was a Jew, but she could have had no 
presentiment that He was other than a common Jew. A 
saucy, clever, susceptible character was hers, with some- 
thing of what the French call naivete. She had had 
much intercourse with men, in which she had learned 
how to parry and thrust in the fencing which generally 
takes place in preliminary conversation. 

" How is this ? " said she with a light sneer. " Oh, so! 
a Jew, when he is warm and tired and thirsty from his 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 75 

journey, can beg at least a drink of water of a Samaritan 
woman ! " And she seemed to triumph over the humil- 
iation of her natural enemy, and to postpone His request 
capriciously until He explained His unusual conduct. 

A Converter of Men must not play at games of jest 
and sarcasm. Jesus addressed Himself directly to His 
work. " If you had known the bounty of God and who 
it is that says, ( Permit Me to drink/ you would have 
made request of Him and He would have given you liv- 
ing water." It seems a gentle reproof at her withholding 
what God so bountifully gives to all men. It seems to 
imply that if she had spiritual insight she would have 
been the asker, and He would have given her a most 
valuable spiritual gift typified by the water of the well. 
His spirit is intent upon imparting a spiritual gift to 
His hearer, so intent that, thirsty as He was, He lets the 
pitcher of water sit by the well while He pushes the con- 
versation which so engages Him. 

Jesus, the Christ, is the gift of God ; life is the gift of 
Jesus Christ : that is what He is urgent in teaching. 

The tone and manner and air of the Teacher must 
have aroused the curiosity of this excitable woman. Then 
he was not a common Jew ! Then he was not a mere 
traveling Rabbi ! " Who is he ? " That phrase probably 
thrilled her. " Speaking to thee/' That must mean that 
he has something more to be addressed especially to her. 
Who is this man, and what can he mean ? She began to 
feel the power of his presence. He was becoming too pro- 
found and drawing too near to her inmost being. She 
will do what all sinners do when the convicting Spirit 
of God arouses their consciences. She will ward off the 
thrusts. 



76 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 



BECOMING INTERESTED. 

She had begun with, "Thou Jew"; now she calls 
him by the dignified "Sir." But it was not in her 
nature to follow up this respectful word with such as, 
" You speak the truth ; I am a very ignorant woman ; 
you seem to be a wise man ; teach me." No, she was 
not spiritually developed to that height. She could 
go no further than her light. She could not have 
thought of a better water, got by prayer, without visible 
instrument. She doubted the ability of the speaker to 
make good his words. Did he mean that the living 
water was the running stream which came up from the 
hidden springs to fill the well ? Why, he did not have 
the means of reaching even the water that already lay in 
the bed of the well : how could he penetrate to the 
springs below ? But did he suppose that this was a 
mere tank or cistern, and that he could bring water 
from some better well ? Then why did he not relieve 
his own wants and not beg of her ? And how dare this 
strange* disparage Jacob's well ? So she replies with 
warmth, " Sir, you have neither bucket nor well-rope : 
and this well is deep ; and you must go at least to the 
bottom to get live water ! What do you mean then by 
living water ? Or are you greater than our father 
Jacob ? It was no less a person than Jacob who gave 
us this well ; and he consecrated it forever by drinking 
of it and giving it to his children." We can fancy how 
she gazed with light scorn at the travel-stained stranger 
who seemed to be professing to be greater than the great 
Patriarch. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 77 

This was an attempt to bring the discourse down to 
an ordinary level, from the spiritual to the natural, from 
the heavenly to the earthly father, from Jehovah to 
Jacob. It was seeking refuge in the prejudice of an- 
tiquity. Those who do so, forget that there is nothing 
old which was not once new. But this is the ordinary 
recourse of unspiritual men when pressed by high spirit- 
ual considerations. Claims resting on antiquity are 
often fallacious. If there be a line reaching down the 
ages perhaps I am not in it. If Jacob did give this well 
to his children perhaps I am not one of his descendants, 
as, in point of fact, this woman most probably was not. 
The nearest approach she could have made to it was that 
of being a descendant of a half-breed, the child of 
some Israelite who had married into one of the families 
which had been brought into Samaria by Asnapper. 

THIRST. 

Very patient and wise is Jesus. He will not enter 
into the discussion of personal comparisons. Thirst is 
the world's affliction. Absence of physical moisture 
from a man's body for a day or two brings indescribable 
distress, and if continued long will cause death. Every 
human desire is likened to that bodily thirst : the thirst 
for pleasure, the thirst for power, the thirst for gold, 
even the thirst for knowledge. Whatever can slake 
these or any one of them is a most desirable thing. But 
they return so soon again ! How continuously human 
experience verifies the saying of Jesus : " Whoso drink- 
eth of this water shall thirst again." Jacob had drunk 
of that well ; so had his sons ; so had generation 



78 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

after generation ; so had this woman. But they had 
all " thirsted again. " So had the men who had 
endeavored at the cisterns of this world, its mar- 
kets, its schools, its societies, to slake the thirst of the 
spirit. 

" But whoso drinketh of the water that I shall give 
him shall not be forever thirsting," added the Teacher. 
And He adds immediately what explains that saying by 
the words, " The water that I shall give him shall be 
in him, a fount of water springing up unto the life of 
eternity." For the relief of all thirsts men have been 
compelled to go outside of themselves, and the effort 
was wearing and the relief was temporary, and the old 
thirst came back with perhaps greater violence. This 
woman had experienced that in her seeking for carnal 
satisfaction. So has every slave to the gambling or the 
drink propensity. No remorse, no resolution, no exer- 
cise of the will power has ever been able to cure any man 
or woman of licentiousness or kleptomania or dipsomania; 
no one has ever been cured who has not had within him- 
self the spring of which Jesus spoke to this poor woman. 
No occasional applications to external agencies have been 
effective. The spring of water must be within. It must 
be carried in the man ; then there will be no going to 
wells. In the world of morals men ordinarily go to 
tanks or cisterns in which some one has put water which, 
however " living" when first drawn, is now stagnant. 
To change the figure, all attempts at the spiritual life 
without having the spring inside of us will be like gal- 
vanizing a corpse : some motion like that which comes 
from life may be produced, but not life itself ; that 
must operate from within. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 79 

UNCERTAIN SIGHT. 

These lessons come to us, as at this distance we study 
the words of Jesus, but surely they could scarcely have 
been manifest to this woman. It is a little difficult to 
interpret her reply. Did the talk of Jesus sound to her 
like the dreamings of a mystic ? Did it make her feel 
more than ever a great want of her nature ? Her char- 
acter was not an entirely simple one. What did she 
mean by saying, " Sir, give me this water, that I never 
thirst nor come here to draw " ? It would seem that she 
could not rise to any height which lifted her above esti- 
mating any thing other than as it ministered to her bod- 
ily satisfaction. The intimation of the existence of 
something else puzzled, perplexed, and disturbed her; 
and she did what thousands do in this day, when the 
realities of the spiritual world are brought down to con- 
found the frivolities of their inconsequential and sinful 
lives. She gave frivolous treatment to a great, grave 
subject, just as they joke about religion. Some hold 
may have been laid upon her spiritual nature, but her 
reply seems to be a banter: " Sir, give me this water that 
I thirst not." If she had been entirely sincere and had 
comprehended what Jesus said, she would not have 
added, "nor come hither to draw." That seems to turn 
the whole subject into a joke. 

How often that same spirit is in the prayers of even 
the disciples of the Lord, in my prayers and yours! It 
is the spirit which seeks only for such gifts of God as 
set us free from temporal cares, as make it unnecessary 
to toil toward the well in the noonday sun. If the 
woman had cried: " Give me this water, even if it wash 



80 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

away that which is very dear to me, even if it make life 
more toilsome, only so that the thirst of my spirit be 
slaked forever," there would have been no need for the 
next and painful movement of Jesus. But the painful 
movement was made necessary by her words and man- 
ner. God will have no trifling with sin. He brings the 
banterer to his senses when He makes him see that his 
secret sins are set in the light of God's countenance. 

FOUR ESSENTIALS FOR SOUL SAVING. 

But notice four characteristics of the dealing of Jesus 
with this sinful woman. And let all who are striving to 
convert sinners from the error of their ways study the 
ivisdom, the delicacy, the fidelity, the kindness of the 
Great Master. 

"Go call thy husband and come hither. " That any 
one who has read the Evangely should think that this 
was said because Jesus thought it indecorous to continue 
conversation with the woman alone, or that He did not 
think that a woman was a proper recipient of the great 
truths of the Gospel, seems inconceivable, and yet both 
suggestions have been made by learned men. 

The Lord knew she had no husband. His request has 
been well considered a concealed question. He wished 
to call her sins to her mind. Plainly, lying was not 
among those sins. "Husband I have none/' said the 
poor woman, surprised and abashed by the sudden words 
of Jesus. We can see her standing in her confusion be- 
fore her interlocutor. 

That the insight of Jesus was not simply spiritual, but 
was also divine, appears in His next words, which were 
as kind and tender as they could be under the circum- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 81 

stances: "Thou hast well said — it is good to go as far 
as thou hast in saying that thou hast no husband; in 
that thou didst well to speak the literal truth." In 
verse 18 it is unfortunate that the word is translated 
"truly/' for that was not the fact, and in the original 
it is the noun, not the adverb. The Master had just 
quoted the word "husband" from the speech of the 
woman, and added "in that" — in that one particular — 
she had told the truth, and He complimented her for 
that much; but, very naturally, she had sought to con- 
ceal the disparaging facts of her life; these He recalled 
to her. " Thou hast had five husbands, and he whom thou 
now hast is thy man, but not thy husband." Here was 
a great light let in on all her dark past. " Five!" The 
precise number. She had had five. Marriage was loose 
among the Samaritans. Perhaps some of the husbands 
had died; perhaps her behavior had driven off the oth- 
ers. Her present paramour, perhaps, had been willing 
to have easy intercourse with her, but knew her and her 
history too well to bind himself by marriage vows. 
"Thou now hast"; former wrongs continued in the 
present sin. 

THE DISCERNER OF HEARTS. 

However that may have been, the answer of Jesus 
showed the woman that He was a discerner of hearts. 
She admitted that He was a prophet ; but with the 
perversity which in all ages has marked human nature in 
regard to spiritual things, instead of submitting humbly 
and promptly to the instruction of the new Teacher she 
strives to draw Him and herself away from the considera- 
tion of her own personal sinfulness and its cure, and she 



82 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

does this by dexterously endeavoring to turn their talk 
to topics of theologic dispute and ritualistic observance. 
This seems to appear upon the face of the story. But 
may there not have begun to spring up in the poor 
woman's heart a hope that the Prophet, who had shown 
her her sinfulness, would show her the way to salvation ? 
Let us take this gentler suggestion. Then she would be 
confronted by the opposing claims of the two churches, 
represented by Jesus and herself. She speaks of the dif- 
ference between Gerizim and Jerusalem. It reveals her 
conflict. " Must I leave the mount of my fathers and 
go to Jerusalem for salvation ? " That seems to have 
been her question. 

THE WIDENESS OF THE GOSPEL. 

Then Jesus revealed to her the great wideness of the 
Gospel truth. 

1. As to the place : it was to be everywhere, " not only 
in this mountain/' " not only at Jerusalem." 

2. As to the object of worship : it was not to be " our 
father Jacob, " or any one else below The Father, the 
Eternal Father of all men. 

3. As to the motive : it would not be that of one 
searching after the inscrutable, but that of finite seekers 
after an infinite Seeker who was seeking them. 

4. As to the character : it was to be spiritual, since 
" God is spirit " (not a spirit), and could be satisfied with 
nothing that was merely formal or false. This grand 
presentation of truth (1) set her free from all ecclesias- 
tical embarrassments, and (2) brought her directly to the 
personal Head of the universe as to her loving Father, 
and (3) made her feel that that heavenly Father was 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 83 

more anxious to save her, the poor Samaritan prostitute, 
than she was to be saved, and (4) taught her that the 
seat of all true religion is in the spirit, that all true 
religious culture is of the spirit, and that all real and 
permanent religious results are for the spirit. 

The whole failure of the Samaritan religion, and of all 
others before His day, lay in a failure to apprehend those 
four fundamentals of Christ's Gospel. All religious de- 
fections since His day have been along the lines of (1) 
ecclesiasticism, (2) sectarianism, (3) bigotry, and (4) rit- 
ualism. His was true liberality. But true liberality 
never burns down the house that it may enjoy the open 
air. He stood for the truth of the past and the present 
while announcing the growing and glowing future. 
" Salvation (was) of the Jews." 

How earnest the Prophet was ! From the stately, in- 
tellectual, authoritative " Verily, verily I say unto you," 
He drops to the hearty "Believe Me." His soul draws 
near the soul He is saving. He kindles. " The hour is 
coming ! " He exclaims as He looks toward the eastern 
hills to see a new day dawn on the Syrian noon in which 
they were talking. And He seems to see it, and cries 
out, " It now is." The day which ushers in a religion that 
does not depend upon church or sect or narrow creed or 
rigid rites has dawned, has leaped the orient horizon 
and is to break upon the world — a religion which can 
embrace at the same moment an immaculate Jesus and a 
Samaritan prostitute ! 

It was overwhelming. It was both sweet and grand 
to her. The woman believed in a coming "Messias, 
who is called Christ." She believed that when the 
Christ should come He would tell all that was necessary 



84 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

for salvation. Perhaps it is worth while to notice 
that the word used by the woman for "tell" is that 
which is the root of the word " gospel." The Coming 
Christ will give us all the Gospel, her words imply. 
Perhaps they were accompanied by a look into the eyes 
of Christ which meant, " Perhaps Thou, who hast 
searched and hast told me such wondrous things, art the 
Messiah ? " The words, the look, were too much for 
Him. His whole spirit was intent on saving the woman, 
and He took no counsel of prudence, but then and there, 
at Sychar, Drunkards' Town, and to this sin-soiled 
woman He opened his heart and acknowledged Himself 
Jehovah's Christ ! And, greater than if a world had 
been made, a soul was saved ! The mighty spirit of 
Jesus was refreshed. When His disciples drew near 
and urged Him to eat, He said : ' ' I have meat to eat that 
ye know not of." The Saviour forgot His bread, the 
saved forgot her water-pot. There was joy at Jacob's 
well and joy at the throne of God. 

Like every true convert the woman became an im- 
mediate missionary. She went to the men in the city 
who knew what she had been. She might have excused 
herself and felt that they would not believe a harlot ; but 
she did her simple duty. She frankly bore her testi- 
mony. She extended the invitation. It was the same 
which Jesus had given to the disciples of the Baptist. 
The argument was in the real transformation of char- 
acter. The man who could change such a woman was 
worth seeing. And they went and saw and heard, and 
kept Him two days. Some simply gave intellectual as- 
sent to the Messiahship of Jesus on the testimony of the 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 85 

woman to His miraculous insight. Others entered into 
her very experience for themselves and could testify that 
they knew that this was truly God's Anointed Saviour 
of the world ; for whoso could save the Samaritan of 
Drunkards' Town could save the world. 






" For no men or women that live to-day, 
Be they as good or as bad as they may, 

Ever would dare to leave 
In faintest pencil or blackest ink 
All that they truly and really think, 

What they have said 

And what they have done, 
What they have lived and what they have felt, 

Under the stars 

Or under the sun." 






VI. 
W$t <&xw\ €laim of Jesus. 



John V. 

(17) Jesus answered them, " My Father worlceth even until now, 
and I work." (18) For this cause therefore the Jews sought the 
more to kill Sim, because He ntit only brake the Sabbath, but also 
called God His own Father, making Himself equal with God. (19) 
Jesus therefore answered and said unto them, ' ' Verily, verily, I say 
unto you, The Son can do nothing outside of Himself, but what He 
seeth the Father doing : for what things soever He doeth, these the 
Son also is doing, in like manner. (20) For the Father loveth the Son, 
and showeth Him all things that Himself doeth : and greater works 
than these will He show Him, that ye may marvel. (21) For as the 
Father raiseth the dead and quickeneth them, even so the Son also 
quickeneth whom He will. (22) For neither doth the Father judge 
any man, but He hath given all judgment unto the Son ; (23) that 
all may honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He that 
honoreth not the Son honoreth not the Father which sent Him. (24) 
Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth My word, and be- 
lieveth Him that sent Me, hath eternal life, and cometh not into 
judgment, but hath passed out of death into life. (25) Verily, verily, 
I say unto you, The hour cometh, and now is, when the dead shall 
hear the voice of the Son of God ; and they that hear shall live. 
(26) For as the Father hath life in Himself, even so gave He to the 
Son also to have life in Himself : (27) and He gave Him, authority 
to execute judgment, because He is the Son of man. (28) Marvel not 
at this : for the hour cometh, in which all that are in the tombs 
shall hear His voice, (29) and shall come forth ; they that have done 
good, unto the resurrection of life ; and they that have done ill, unto 
the resurrection of judgment. (30) i" can of myself do nothing : as 
I hear, I judge : and my judgment is righteous ; because I seek not 
Mine own will, but the will of Him that sent Me." 



THE GREAT CLAIM OF JESUS. 

JESUS CHARGED WITH SABBATH-BREAKING. 

~T~JT7"HEN a man once incurs the enmity of a sect he 
V V may expect even his beneficences to be colored 
by their prejudices. Jesus had aroused the dislike of 
the Pharisaic portion of His people by His lack of 
respect for their man-made ethics. This was specially 
observable in regard to the Sabbath law. As that law was 
laid down through Moses, it promoted the physical, social, 
and moral welfare of all the people. But by degrees 
there had come to be intolerable additions made to it by 
sects of teachers who had no divine warrants ; and these 
additions had brought the law of God into disrepute by 
laying upon men burdens which they could not bear. 
Thus one sect taught that a man must never change the 
posture in which he found himself when he awoke on 
the Sabbath-day — a dreadful way of resting. There were 
many such regulations. 

Now Jesus had healed a paralytic on the Sabbath-day 
and directed the poor beggar to take his little mat and 
go home. Here was a double sin. He had relieved 
suffering on the Sabbath. He had directed a man to 
carry his bed on the Sabbath. Therefore they persecuted 
Him. Perhaps they added a trial before some neighbor- 
ing inferior council, of which there were many in the 
country in that day. It is certainly better to come to 
trial before one public tribunal than to have one's case 



90 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

traversed by hundreds of private irresponsible courts. 
Mark, they did not seek to kill the man who carried his 
bed to his home, but they did seek to kill the good 
Healer. 

It is a lesson of warning against making laws for the 
government of others without the divine sanction. This 
case is another illustration of how much more zealous 
ritualists are for the ecclesiastical directory than the 
moral law. 

THE CHRIST'S DEFENSE. 

The charge was that Jesus was accustomed to do " these 
things " on the Sabbath. The defense of Jesus was no 
denial of the facts in the specification, but a flat denial 
of the inference in the indictment, namely, that thereby 
He was violating the Sabbath. The remarkable retort 
was that to charge Him with violating the Sabbath was 
to charge God with that sin. God, Jehovah, who had 
given Sabbath-law, having written it in all the fibers of 
every human being and of every other animal, and in the 
very soil from which all things sprung, had always been 
at work of sustenation and recuperation. There never 
had been a Sabbath-day since Sinai, never since the 
creation, in which He had not been at work sustaining 
and propagating the animal and the vegetable life, and 
working all the forces of the universe ; and He was the 
Father of the Accused. He put it in this shape : " My 
Father is at work until now, and I am at work/' And 
there must have been something in the tones and looks 
of Jesus which made it quite apparent that He claimed 
a relationship with Almighty God which was quite sin- 
gular, and apart from that which any other man claims 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 91 

when he says "Our Father." It was a claim to be 
" equal with God." 

His hearers so understood it. As a new indictment 
they charged that He was making Himself equal with 
God. He understood the charge. Did He deny it? 
Never. He accepted it. He deliberately took the posi- 
tion it assigned Him with His contemporaries and with 
posterity, namely, that of being a crazy man, or a bad 
man, or God. If not God, He was either very wicked 
or intellectually insane. If His claim to be equal with 
God be denied, the world would be forced to determine 
whether he was intellectually or morally insane ; for 
Jesus certainly believed that He was God. Against His 
being wicked must forever stand the sanctity of His 
immaculate personality, which, after passing without 
even a "fault," as Pilate declared, through the ordeal of 
ecclesiastical and civil courts, all hostile, has gone out 
to humanity and stood for eighteen centuries as that of 
the loftiest and holiest human being, having the best 
heart that ever beat in a man's bosom, and having led 
the most beautifully beneficent and most sacredly self- 
sacrificing life ever known to our humanity. Insane ? 
The man who in the nineteenth century would suggest 
that in regard to Jesus, the King of Thought, would 
thereby bring upon himself the suspicion of insanity. 

HIS AUGUST CLAIM. 

Jesus simply amplified the expression of His august 
claim. 

This is a subject upon which there is no place for 
dogmatism. We can be little helped by processes of 
reasoning. We must place ourselves in the posture of 



92 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 

devout attention and strive to apprehend what no finite 
mind can comprehend. 

First of all,, there is the existence of fatherhood and 
sonhood in the one God. That we can not comprehend. 
But it is no more difficult of comprehension than the 
existence of the same relation among men, nor indeed 
that relation of vitality with material substances by 
which organism came into existence. We are not called 
upon to comprehend these revelations, but to accept them 
on apprehension. There is " the Father " ; there is 
" the Son " ; and Jesus is "the Son " ; and of ourselves 
we never could have discovered any of this, for it is alto- 
gether a revelation. 

Embracing the Sabbath question, with every thing 
else involved in ethics, Jesus defended Himself against 
His accusers by the solemn "Verily, verily" assertion 
that it was impossible that He should do any thing outside 
of Himself. "The Son can do nothing of Himself," 
away from Himself, outside His own nature. As His 
nature produced the revelation of the' Sabbath-law it is 
absurd to suppose that He ever could violate the Sab- 
bath. In an autocracy "the king can do no wrong." 
His will is law. The fact that the man had been healed 
by the Author of the Sabbath-law forbade that action 
to be laid at His door as an allegation of immorality. 
"The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He 
seeth the Father do" This is a claim upon the part of 
Jesus that His acts were the acts of the Father. When 
He did any thing and saw it done, so intimate is the 
union between the Father and the Son, that He recog- 
nized it as the Father's doing. For instance, when He 
saw the paralytic arise and take up his bed and walk, 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 93 

after nearly fourscore years of helplessness, He regarded 
that as a product of an act of God the Father. 

To make the union appear more clearly one of 
entire equality between the Father and the Son, Jesus 
adds : " For whatsoever thing He doeth these also doeth 
the Son likewise" That is to say, (1) the Son never 
does any thing without the Father, so that the acts 
of Jesus are the acts of Jehovah, and (2) the Father 
never does any -thing without the Son, so that the acts 
of Jehovah are the acts of Jesus. Elsewhere in the 
Ohristain Scriptures it is revealed specifically that the 
Father created the worlds by the Son, and that the 
Son is the sustainer of the universe. (Read Col. i., 14-17.) 
What other expression in language could be devised 
to set forth the idea that Jesus is "very God of 
very God " ? But the final and wonderful touch is 
given in the statement, the Father loveth the Son. 
Why should that be stated ? It lifts this divine union 
out of the category of things that are united without 
volition of their own, as warmth and electricitv and 
actinic force in a ray of sunlight, and shows that it is 
voluntary, emotional, mutually gratifying, an insepara- 
ble oneness which involves and evolves a perpetual lov- 
ingness. 

SUBLIME VIEWS OF THE GODHEAD. 

There are no views of the Godhead so sublimely 
uttered anywhere else in literature as these of Jesus. 
He first assumes the fatherhood of the Deity. God is 
father. It is of His essence. He does not become a 
father by creating, but creates because He is a father. 
The human relationship between the begotter and the be- 



94 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

gotten furnishes us with the idea, but it has always sub- 
sisted in God. Unbeginning fatherhood implies unbe- 
ginning sonhood. In point of fact, is there such a son? 
Jesus not only declares that there now is, and conse- 
quently always has eternally been, out that He himself 
is that very Son, not a son as any other man may claim 
to be, but the Son of God. If the unbegun Son, the 
always-existent Son, then He does make Himself equal 
with the Father, as there can not be two Gods. The 
long-inculcated monotheism of the Hebrews made it 
impossible for them to conceive two persons in one God, 
and it is probably a metaphysical impracticability for 
any mind in which the idea of God is that of an infinite 
or even of a supreme Existence to conceive two Gods. 
If, then, Jesus claims to be the Only- Begotten, being 
one with the Father, the Father and the Son, neither 
having had precedent or subsequent existence either of 
the other, then He stands before all the laws of human 
thought the equal of God, and consequently the very 
God. Jesus states His claim to two prerogatives of the 
Most High God. 

THE POWER OVER LIFE. 

1. The power over life is in His hands. He vivifies 
and revivifies. He creates life and He raises the dead. 
He had first healed a life-long paralytic. The enemies 
of Jesus were so spiritually stupefied by the incrustation of 
formalism and ritualism wherein they were wrapped that 
the fact that this was done on the Sabbath-day obscured 
the splendor of the power and beneficence which it in- 
volved. But that was a divine act and fell into a sub- 
section of His general divine power to do with life 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 95 

all that can be conceived capable of being done with 
life. 

He claimed first that power which they and their 
fathers understood to be the prerogative of Jehovah 
alone, the power to impart life. (See Deut. xxxii., 39; 
1 James ii., 6; 2 Kings v., 7.) All life is originally 
in God. If we find that slightest sign of it in the low- 
est animal or in the smallest plant, we know that it 
flowed out of God the Father; and we also now learn that 
it was produced by a motion of the Son. The very 
order in which Jesus puts the words corresponds scien- 
tifically with the facts of creation. He does not say 
that the Father first quickeneth and then raiseth up, 
but just the reverse. An ordinary man would have 
thought of quickening before raising up, if he were 
talking of the creation. Especially would that have 
been true of men in the time of Jesus. But He speaks 
with an accuracy which would be expected of an accom- 
* plished and acute scientist of the nineteenth century. 
His words, "The Father raiseth up the dead and quick- 
eneth," in the material world is equivalent to " God 
lifts up the inorganic to be the organic, by the divine 
impartation of life." This is what was done at creation. 
It is impossible to conceive of any lifeless body taking 
on life, for the ability to "take on " any thing implies 
the possession of life by that which takes on. No; the 
inorganic would have remained forever inorganic, and 
there never could possibly have been any fish in the sea, 
any bird in the air, any animal on the planet, with- 
out the direct and intentional act of some Being 
already (1) having life and (2) the power of imparting 
life. Now, what occurs in the physical world oc- 



96 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

curs also in the spiritual. ■ Creation has its counter- 
part in recreation, generation in regeneration. "Dead 
in trespasses and sin " are we all. And so " dead " will 
we remain spiritually forever, if there come no power of 
new generation from without, as Jesus taught Nicode- 
mus. But " God, who caused the light to shine out of 
darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of 
the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus 
Christ." 

Jesus claimed that that God power of life-giving 
resided in Himself. "Even so (thus also) the Son 
quickeneth whom He will." He is pressing His claim 
of equality with Jehovah. He is insisting that all those 
characteristics which made Jehovah in the mind of the 
Jews to be the only, one-ly, God of heaven and earth, 
were characteristics of Himself, the Son. Life resided 
in the will of -the Father; life resided in the will of the 
Son. There could not be antagonism, nor even diver- 
sity, of will, for there is one God. There seems also an 
intimation of divine reservation of this stupendous 
power. No one else can have this power. The power 
of imparting spiritual life belongs alone to Him who has 
the power to impart animal life. No man or body of 
men can do either. Both are reserved to Jesus. But 
while the phrase narrows the power to Jesus, it enlarges 
the field to the limits of His divine will. " Whom He 
will." Academies, States, churches may exclude, 
expatriate, anathematize whom they will, but those same 
persons so denounced of men may have in them the 
blessed activity of a divine intellectual and spiritual life, 
because they are of those included in the Christ's 
"whom I will." 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 97 



THE POWER OF JUDGMENT. 

2. The opening phrase of verse 22 does not come out 
in our English version. In the Greek " is implied that 
the Father does not of Himself, by His own proper act, 
vivify any, but commits all quickening power to the 
Son; so it is with the judgment." (Dean Alford's 
Greek Text.) The second claim of Jesus, then, is that 
He is the divine Judge of the world. Not apart from 
the Father, but with the Father. Through the whole 
discourse He makes His equality with the Father dis- 
tinctly to involute the equality of the Father with the Son, 
by setting forth the august fact that neither ever does 
any thing " of Himself/' outside of Himself or without 
the other, thus involving and intensifying all that enters 
into the human concept of equality. 

" All judgment unto the Son." We must expand our 
usual conception of judgment from the narrower al- 
though exceedingly important idea of an assize in which 
responsible individuals will be examined as to their con- 
duct and rewarded or condemned according to its char- 
acter, to all possibly conceivable exercises of the judg- 
ment, not only in respect to ethical questions but also in 
regard to every other movement of the intellect in which 
can be involved the judgment which follows comparison 
and precedes volition. The phrase is thoroughly ex- 
haustive. " All judgment " means every decision which 
follows discrimination. It is the determination of which 
is " the fittest/ among all existing things. It is the de- 
termination of what would be the fittest among con- 
ceivable things not yet brought into existence. All that 
is given to the Son. 



98 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

This is the immense claim of Jesus. As He made the 
worlds, as He is the Author of the cosmos, He must have 
been able to judge unerringly and in advance whether 
matter should come into existence, and if so, what por- 
tion of substance should become material, what forms 
that material should assume, and what relations those 
forms of matter should sustain to one another ; also 
whether there should be any forces, and if so, what 
those forces should be, and what relation each force should 
sustain to every other force, and what relation any 
force should sustain to matter, and what should be the 
character and extent of all action, reaction, and inter- 
action. This judgment Jesus claimed to have always 
had. 

THE EXTENT OF CHRIST'S CLAIMS. 

The claim of Jesus extended to the ethical and spirit- 
ual spheres of existence. Not only is any matter or any 
force just what the Son thinks it is, but every act is 
just what the Father thinks it is, and every man is 
just what the Son thinks he is, for the Son thinks what 
the Father thinks, and the Father thinks what the Son 
thinks, neither thinking or judging outside of Himself 
or apart from the other. 

More than that, the Father has given the Son authority 
to execute judgment. As the Son has "life in Himself/' 
precisely as the Father has life in Himself — that is, is so 
totally self-existing that He can claim to be the I AM 
even as the Father does, so He possesses not only the ability 
to decide what is right and so to pronounce sentence, 
but He has also the authority to execute sentence. 

Now all this seems to be set forth to follow up and 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 99 

sustain the phrase "whom He will." The statement 
that "the Son quickeneth whom He will" might sug- 
gest the claim to the exercise of arbitrary and whimsical 
power. But God is God. He can not do wrong. What- 
ever He wills in heaven above or in the earth beneath 
must be a volition which He can execute and which is 
founded upon a judgment. Because that judgment is 
both perfect in intention and infinite in extension, there 
can be no mistake. 

We can not comprehend this dual-unity producing a 
divine lone existence any more than we can comprehend 
the production of the soul by the union of spirit and 
matter, or how spirit and matter can be united in any 
way. We must accept it as a revelation. We must rest 
on the mediatorial government and the mediatorial sal- 
vation, the Father governing through the Son and the 
Father saving through the Son, and neither thinking, 
judging, or acting without the other. It is a sublime reve- 
lation, lifting us among the heights of the infinite and 
plunging us into the depths of the infinite, where we 
should perish if not upheld by the hand of the Infinite 
One. But (vs. 20) the Father loveth the Son, and the Son 
is our kinsman after the flesh as He is the Father's kins- 
man after the spirit. The Son loves us as the Father 
loves Him, and as the Son and the Father are one in 
judgment, one in sentiment, one in volition/ and one in 
action, we have a secure spiritual estate. 

One word, the last word in this passage is the con- 
summate crown of it all, and so lets us into the heart of 
God as all the rest had let us into the mind of God, 
that it ought to secure our perfect homage and devotion 
to Jesus. If there had been a change of one word it 



100 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

would have altered all our conceptions of our relations to 
the Almighty God. The Father "hath given Him 
authority to execute judgment also, because He is the 
Son of " — (God ? No ; but because He is the Son of) — 
"Man!" 

THE REPEATED "VERILY." 

The first "Verily, verily, I say" solemnly introduces 
the announcement of Christ's claim to essential self- 
existence and the power of giving life. The third 
"Verily, verily" solemnly opens the announcement 
of His function as the Judge of all things, and so of all 
mankind. The intermediate ■ e Verily, verily " an- 
nounces the basis of the judgment and the method of 
the life in which any and every man's salvation is 
involved. " He that heareth My word and believeth on 
Him that sent Me hath everlasting life, and shall not 
come into condemnation, but hath passed from death to 
life." What does that mean ? His word is His Gos- 
pel. If any man so hears His voice as to be drawn to 
the Father, that man has the life of eternity. Perhaps 
this means something more than life measured by dura- 
tion, because that must pass away at the close of time, 
and time will be no more when the chronometer of the 
stellar system shall drop into decay. Perhaps it means 
— must it not mean ? — such a life, such a spiritual life, 
as can exist in all the plenitude of its power in a sphere 
which is beyond the conditions of time and space. He 
hath it now. He is virtually in eternity. He shall not 
be condemned. He shall not be thrown into wastage, as 
all things were which were not selected by the Son's 
judgment for incorporation into the physical universe. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 101 

He has passed from death into life. He that does not 
believe in God the Father because of God the Son can 
not be incorporated into the spiritual cosmos, but is 
thrown into the spiritual wastage of the universe and so 
is lost. 

Why does Jesus make this revelation ? Does He dero- 
gate from the Father ? No. All honor that is paid the 
Father is paid the Son, and equally all honor paid the 
Son is homage to the Father. He made this revelation, 
as He himself tells us (vs. 23), "that all men should 
honor the Son even as they honor the Father; he that 
honoreth not the Son honoreth not the Father which 
hath sent Him." 

Two things follow: 

1. He who worships Jesus Christ the Son as God 
thereby worships the Father as God. 

2. He who puts any dishonor upon Jesus Christ the 
Son therebv blasphemes God the Father. 



In that passage, Psalm xlii., 8, where the Psalmist saith, "My 
prayer shall be to the God of my life, " in the Hebrew it is plural : 
to the God of my lives. And you know a man (and more may be 
said in this kind concerning a holy man, a saint) lives several sorts 
of lives, as he lives a vegetative life first, the life of a plant ; and 
then the sensitive life, the life of an animal; and then the rational 
life, the life of a man ; and then, if he be a saint, as you know the 
Psalmist was, a holy life. Now all these lives are comprehended 
together in this one Fountain. "My prayer shall be to the God 
of my lives." It is He that makes me live all these several ways 
that I do live. As I live the life of a plant, I have it from Him ; 
as I live the life of an animal, I partake that life from Him ; as I 
live the life of a man, a rational creature, I shall partake that life 
from Him ; and as I live the life of a saint, a holy man, I partake 
that life from Him, too, which carries the nearest resemblance with 
it of its own life. — Howe. 



VII. 
STfje JBUtaculous jfeciing. 



John VI. 

(1) After these things Jesus went away to the other side of the sea 
of Galilee, which is the sea of Tiberias. (2) And a great multitude 
followed Him, because they beheld the signs which He did on them 
that were sick. (3) And Jesus went up into the mountain, and 
there He sat with His disciples. (4) Notv the passover, the feast of 
the Jews, was at hand. (5) Jesus therefore lifting up His eyes, and 
seeing that a great multitude cometh unto Him. saith unto Philip, 
" Whence are we to buy loaves, that these may eat ? " (6) And this He 
said to prove him : for He Himself kneiv ivhat He would do. (7) 
Philip answered him, " Two hundred pennyworth of loaves is not 
sufficient for them, that every one may take a little.'''' (8) One of His 
disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, saith unto Him, (9) 
" There is a lad here, which hath five barley loaves, and two fishes: 
but what are these among so many? " (10) Jesus said, "Make the peo- 
ple sit down. " Now there ivas much grass in the place. So the men 
sat down, in number about five thousand. (11) Jesus therefore 
took the loaves; and having given thanks, He distributed to them 
that were set down; likewise also of the fishes as much as they 
would. (12) And when they were filled, He saith unto His disciples, 
" Gather up the broken pieces which remain over, that nothing be 
lost." (13) So they gathered them up, and filled twelve baskets with 
broken pieces from the five barley loaves, which remained over unto 
them that had eaten. (14) Wlien therefore the people saw the sign 
which He did, they said, "This is of a truth the prophet that cometh 
into the world." 



THE MIRACULOUS FEEDING. 

TRYING TIMES. 

BETWEEN the second and third years of His min- 
istry, on His third tour of Galilee, two things 
combined which led to the circumstances amid which 
Jesus performed the miracle of feeding five thousand 
people. Jesus had begun this tour not only by preach- 
ing extensively and healing the people, but also by send- 
ing forth the twelve men whom He had chosen to be 
His apostles on a missionary tour of preaching His Gos- 
pel and performing acts of healing. This had rapidly 
increased His fame, and had intensified the interest of 
the people in His ministry. This movement was a great 
advance upon all He had done on the line of Messianic 
claim and work. 

Another event conspired with this to have a great 
effect upon the movements of Jesus. The fearless 
preacher of the Jordan had aroused against himself the 
hatred of Herodias, the bad woman who was living in 
adultery with her brother-in-law Herod. This lustful 
ruler had so little spiritual insight as not to perceive 
that a murder is a worse 'thing than the violation of a 
vicious vow made to a wicked woman. The daughter of 
Herodias had danced before him, and so charmed him 
that he had vowed to grant her request, to the giving of 
the half of his kingdom. At the instigation of her bad 
mother she had requested the head of John the Baptist, 



106 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

and Herod had granted it. ' The headless body of the 
grand preacher had been buried by his disciples, and the 
melancholy news was carried by the disciples of Jesus as 
they were returning to their Master. 

It was a very bitter and trying time for all parties. 
The horror of the decapitation of John Baptist and the 
excitement of their missionary tour and its report to 
Jesus had so worn down the little band that Jesus saw 
how needful it was that they should have a season of 
repose. The slaughter of John, and His own growing 
popularity, and the excitement of the people on both 
accounts, might have raised a sedition. Herod knew 
how Jesus was gaining in power, and the tyrant was be- 
ginning to calculate the political effect thereof. All 
things conspired to make a brief retreat desirable. The 
entire absence of any sign of fanaticism is to be noticed 
in every thing which Jesus did. " Come ye yourselves 
apart into a desert place and rest awhile," is the direc- 
tion which the evangelist Mark reports; and this implies 
that, after being so much with the people, they needed 
the strengthening quiet of solitude. No one can keep 
his intellectual and spiritual tone healthy who is always 
under the public eye. 

AN ATTEMPTED RETREAT. 

So the party took ship and started across perhaps the 
north-western corner of the lake to a spot well known to 
the disciples as a favorite retreat of Jesus. It was not a 
"desert" place in the sense of a place where no vegeta- 
tion grew, but a place usually deserted because it was a 
mountain which lay out of the line of travel. Thither 
Jesus was accustomed to retire when He would engage 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 107 

in a season of protracted prayer. They all knew it so 
well that there is no more precise description. 

But Jesus " could not be hid." The enthusiastic 
populace who had witnessed His miracles watched His 
movements, for anywhere on the shore they could see 
the course of the boat. They immediately began to run 
around the head of the lake, and they went with such 
eager avidity that when Jesus landed He encountered a 
great congregation. He looked on them compassion- 
ately. They were pastorless sheep. Those who should 
have cared for them had forsaken them. Yet they were 
eager to receive instruction, stupid as were their con- 
sciences, dull as was their spiritual insight. So Jesus 
taught them and healed their sick, which, perhaps, had 
been brought in the boats that followed. 

Then another attempt was made to secure retirement, 
but He could not be hid. The Passover was nigh. 
Thousands who had come from another direction on 
their way to Jerusalem heard that Jesus was near, and 
poured up the mountain to the famous Teacher. 

AT WORK AGAIN. 

The compassion of Jesus was stirred. He called the 
attention of the disciples to their physical needs, and 
then began a long discourse on the doctrines and princi- 
ples of His Kingdom. Human nature will assert its 
needs even in a congregation sitting under the ministry 
of the blessed Jesus. As the day wore on, the people 
began to grow very hungry. Combining the four narra- 
tives in the Evangely, it would seem that there were two 
suggestions in regard to the want of food : one coming 
from Jesus in the early part of the day, and the other 



108 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

a reminder from the disciples of Jesus as the evening 
drew on. 

However that was, at one time there was a conversa- 
tion with Philip, introduced by Jesus for the purpose of 
testing Philip and showing him his dullness of spiritual 
insight. " Whence shall we buy bread, that these may 
eat ? " He knew what He would do ; but how far had 
Philip's faith grown ? Not much. He had witnessed 
some miracles of Jesus. The natural reply of a faithful 
spirit would have been something like this: "Lord, 
dost Thou ask me this question as Thou didst tell the 
servants at Oana to fill up the pots with water ? " Or, 
" Lord, I am not concerned : Thou art here : He that 
turned water into wine can change this grass to bread, 
or somehow spread for all this company a table in the 
wilderness." 

But no such answer came. One of the trials of Jesus 
in the days of flesh was, as in this day it still is, the lack 
of that spiritual insight which makes faith. Philip 
answered : "Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not 
sufficient for them that every one of them may take a 
little." Two hundred denarii of their money would 
be about thirty-five dollars of ours, which would give 
only a little more than half a cent's worth of bread for 
each. That would be "a little," truly. And perhaps 
that was all that Treasurer Judas had at that time in 
the exchequer. More likely it was a sum quite as much 
exceeding the whole apostolic store as it fell short of 
the amount requisite to procure enough food for the 
crowd. And perhaps the form of the question of 
Jesus may have suggested another difficulty to Philip : 
" Whence ? " The town was so far that it would be 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 109 

several hours before any person, even amply supplied 
with money, could go and procure and bring the requi- 
site amount of food. Philip's faith was not sufficient for 
the test. 

THE DISCIPLES IN TROUBLE. 

The day wore on. The disciples began to be appre- 
hensive that there would be trouble, and so approached 
their Great Master, and suggested, as Luke tells us 
(ix., 12), that He should send the multitude away, so 
that they might scatter themselves over the surrounding 
country and procure food. " Give ye them to eat," 
said the Master. Then Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, 
having been with the Lord from the beginning, and 
possibly having heard the suggestion of Jesus earlier in 
the day and the conversation with Philip, and probably 
having been around the company on a sort of foraging 
expedition, answered : " There is a lad here who has 
five barley loaves and two small fishes ; but what are they 
among so many?" The word "lad "here means "a 
little slave." He belonged to some family in the neigh- 
borhood — probably had been sent out to sell these 
provisions, — and had followed the multitude to find cus- 
tomers. Perhaps he had come with other food, but this 
was all of his stock that was left when Andrew discov- 
ered him. 

Then Jesus proceeded. First He had the crowd 
seated in an orderly fashion in regular groups, perhaps 
in about one hundred companies of fifty each (Luke 
ix., 14), so that the disciples could serve the whole mul- 
titude without confusion. The place was grassy. When 
the great congregation was seated, how like a garden of 



110 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

living flowers the plain must have looked from the ele- 
vated ground which there sloped up all around the 
grassy basin. 

JESUS BRINGS RELIEF. 

Then Jesus, following the pious custom of His coun- 
trymen, gave thanks for the food which He had taken 
into His hands. Then He divided the food among His 
twelv 7 e disciples (Luke xiv., 19), and they passed down 
the ranks and distributed to the sitting company. How 
this was done we do not know. Each of the twelve 
might have gone, breaking from his less than half a 
loaf to give to the first, and then found his piece as large 
as it was before, or larger. Or, one of the disciples may 
be fancied as having given the whole piece to the near- 
est person, and that person dividing with his neighbor, 
each having more left as he gave and did eat, until each 
one found that as a certain mouthful finally satisfied 
him, behold, it was the last mouthful of the loaf. 

"How this was performed we have no means of 
knowing. The historians write the facts, and offer no 
theory. There was no supply called forth from the 
multitude, and the disciples had none in reserve. The 
astonishment and enthusiasm of all parties show this. 
It could have been no feat of legerdemain. It has had 
no parallel, and no attempt has been made, so far as is 
known to us, to imitate it. It was no hastening of the 
process of nature, for it was baked bread that was mul- 
tiplied. If a handful of uninjured wheat had been 
made to grow in an hour into the bulk of a harvest, the 
process would have been measurably intelligible, and 
might have been described as an astoundingly rapid 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IXSIGHT. Ill 

pushing forward of natural processes. But here were 
five baked loaves and two small fishes already cooked. 
More than five thousand persons, after a long fast, ate 
of these and nothing else, ate to repletion, and then the 
fragments were hugely more than the original bulk. It 
was an astounding fact, a stupendous act, and was so 
regarded by those who were of that large party. Whether 
the food grew in the hands of Jesus, or in the hands of 
the disciples, or in the hands or in the mouths of the 
eaters, there seems no possibility of knowing. The eye- 
witnesses do not adventure an opinion. Nor can we. 
It is a fact in the history of Jesus, and as such we must 
simply record it and honestly study it." (" The Light 
of the Nations," p. 389.) 

Let us endeavor to gather profitable lessons from the 
miracle. 

THE CHRIST'S COMPASSION : QUIET AND DIET. 

1. The first thing which strikes us is the compassion- 
ateness of our Lord to men. Here there had gathered 
about Him a multitude of persons who belonged to an 
obscure corner of an obscure country. They were 
unknown to courts; they were unknown to schools. Not 
one of them probably was ever mentioned or alluded to 
fifty years after his death. They were as near nothing 
as probably any five thousand people could be. And 
yet the Lord had compassion upon them; they were 
among men what among sheep would be a flock consid- 
ered so worthless that no shepherd would own them. 
And yet the Lord had compassion upon them. 

His compassion extended to their bodies. There 
never was a man more "spiritually-minded " than Jesus, 



112 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

and never a teacher who seemed to care more for the 
body as the vehicle of the spirit. This He showed 
throughout His career. He showed it here in calling 
His disciples away from labor to refreshment, and in 
acknowledging the effect upon the body of the exercise 
of the spirit. He did not believe that the service of the 
Heavenly Father required the destruction of the earthly 
child. His clear spiritual insight showed Him the true 
relations of the spirit and body, so that He never 
regarded the latter as either the tyrant or slave of the 
former, but rather as the instrument, the use of which 
the spirit could not long enjoy without the tender care 
which embraced proper nourishment and proper rest. 
He knew what sometimes it requires many years for 
some very intelligent men to learn, namely: that the 
two most important curatives are Quiet and Diet. He 
rested the disciples and fed the multitude, and taught 
His disciples to be interested in the bodies of men. 

THE ARITHMETIC OF GOD. 

2. The story of this miracle presents us the contrast 
between the arithmetic of man and the arithmetic of 
God. To human sight it was thus: one person, a lad, a 
slave; five cakes, small cakes, barley cakes; plus two 
fishes, very small fishes < 5,000 men -f- women + chil- 
dren — and children, ravenous little eaters ! " Loaves" is 
a misleading word to western ears. It implies something 
large, whereas the loaf spoken of in the narrative was 
about the size of our ordinary griddle-cake or buck- 
wheat-cake. Divide one of those into a thousand equal 
parts, and see if one of those parts is worth even a starv- 
ing man's effort to put it in his mouth. Take a min- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 113 

now and divide it, if you can, into two thousand five 
hundred parts, and give one of those parts to a man and 
tell him that when he had made his meal of it he may- 
give the remainder to his wife and children ! That's 
the absurd view which the thought of such a commis- 
sary presented to the disciples. But God's arithmetic 
is not ours. With Him one shall chase a thousand and 
two shall put ten thousand to flight. Man would say, 
if one chase one it is a victory. Man would state the 
proposition thus: if, by any means, one chase a thou- 
sand, then two may put two thousand to flight; but God 
says ten thousand. Now, apply that principle to this 
mode of provisioning a multitude. 

THE MAJESTIC SIMPLICITY OF THE CHRIST. 

3. One is struck with the divine serenity, the majes- 
tic simplicity of Jesus. There is often such fussiness 
when men, even some great men, are about to do 
some great thing. But here is no hurry, no attempt to 
divert the attention of the people from the mode of the 
bread multiplication. Simply, through His disciples, 
Jesus arranges the men in groups of fifty each, so that 
they can be properly served, and there shall be no hurry, 
no scramble, no unseemly disorder. How to eliminate 
hurry, not haste, from these lives of ours, is a great 
practical problem for us; and here, in the manner of 
the Master, we have a very helpful object-lesson. 

"■ HIS SIMPLE DEVOUTNESS. 

4. The pious custom of the Lord's countrymen was to 
give thanks to the Giver before eating the gift. The 
heart of Jesus was always turned toward the Father; so 
He expressed gratitude to Him who is the fount of every 



114 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

stream of favor, while exercising His own inalienable 
divine prerogative of consecrating the bread He was 
about to multiply. Thankful for so little ! About to 
make it so much ! What an example to us, who have 
not this power of creating increase ! And does it not 
suggest the question whether, if we were more pious, we 
might not be more powerful ? If the performance of a 
miracle may be retarded for prayer, shall we lose any 
thing if, before we begin the day's trading, or the day's 
work, or the day's teaching, or the day's traveling, or 
the day's writing, or the day's preaching, we consecrate, 
as best we may, the coming effort by most earnest and 
devout address to God ? 

THE EMPLOYMENT OF OTHERS. 

5. It is a striking feature of this narrative that it rep- 
resents Jesus as not doing of Himself any thing He 
could do by another. He employs the disciples to do 
what they can do, and reserves for Himself only those acts 
which can be performed by no one else. This has been 
His plan ever since He made the world. He has done 
for man what man could not do for himself, but never 
what man himself could do. He made the soil and the 
seed, but never made a plow, a mill, an oven, or even 
a loaf of bread when man could make it for himself. 
But in the desert He made the manna, and in this mount- 
ain He multiplied the food. But He did not throw away 
the five cakes and two little fishes, nor did He arrange 
the company for the repast, nor did He serve tables, nor 
did He gather up the fragments. It is a hurtful fanati- 
cism to expect God to do for us what we can do for our- 
selves, but it is a rational and blessed enthusiasm to ex- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 115 

pect Him to do all needed things which lie beyond our 
strength. 

And men at the head of any institution, bank, railroad, 
factory, State, family, church, may learn this lesson: Never 
do what you can make others do, that you may reserve 
your whole strength for those things which you alone 
can perform. That is to be like God ; that is godliness. 

THE TOUCH OF THE LORD : AND SIMPLE 
OBEDIENCE. 

6. What the Lord touches grows. It is blessed to re- 
ceive at the hands of Jesus. The divine touch gives 
divine efficacy. The preachers of the Gospel of the 
blessed God know this. Whatever a preacher takes from 
Plato or Shakespeare, from philosopher or poet, he can 
give to his hearers, but it will be no other than that 
which he got ; but whoso goes direct to Jesus and takes 
the truth from Him and imparts it to the hearers gives 
what grows. It grew larger as it passed through the 
preacher's mind, and grows larger as it enters the hearer's 
mind, and still increases as the hearer tells it to another. 

7. This blessing comes from simple obedience. As 
the disciples stood around the Teacher, after they had 
obeyed His directions in arranging the company, He 
broke the cakes and gave each not quite half of one, and 
bade them give these small sections to the multitude. 
We can imagine a doubter, like Philip or Thomas, saying 
to himself, if not aloud, " What's the use of this ? This is 
too ridiculous ! What ! feed a thousand people with less 
than half a barley-cake ? There is no proportion of 
means to end." If He had said so and stopped, the 
miracle would have failed, even as on another occasion 



116 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITCJAL INSIGHT. 

Jesus could do no mighty work because of their unbelief. 
Or, if the disciple had eaten that portion and not im- 
parted of it to some one in the company, the miracle 
would have been limited. That is one reason why the 
whole world is not fed with that Bread which has come 
down from heaven. Men throng the church and go 
away and meet hundreds of people during the week and 
never give a portion of that portion of the truth which 
they had received at the hands of the disciple of the 
Lord. A Christian who does that is as mean and as 
destructive as Andrew would have been if he had re- 
ceived a portion from the hand of the Master and had 
declined or neglected to share it with one of the hunger- 
ing multitude. 

ECONOMY AND ABUNDANCE. 

Let not the lesson of economy be lost. Of all people 
the Americans are the most wasteful. There is scarcely 
a family in New York which does not actually throw 
away enough to support an oriental household. Economy 
is not mean ; stinginess is. One of the troubles of the poor 
in this free land of plenty is the absence of economy. 
Now here was One who could make a loaf of bread as large 
as the mountain on which they stood, and who had made 
all the fishes in all the sea and was about to produce 
abundance ; what did He want with the five barley cakes 
and the two small fishes ? He could instantly have filled 
all laps with food ; but He did not fail to use the little 
store in hand. And then, when all were entirely satisfied, 
what did He want with the fragments and the crumbs? 
They might have been left. But He never has wasted 
one atom of matter nor one volt of force. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 117 

Then, behold the abundance ! The word translated 
" baskets" in our common version means pockets or 
wallets. The twelve baskets were probably the twelve 
wallets of the twelve apostles which they carried on their 
journeys. When all the women, all the children, and 
all the men had been satisfied, so greatly had the little 
store increased that each apostle was able to carry away 
with him provisions sufficient for a week. In the spirit- 
ual world the like law prevails. He who imparts any 
truth has more truth left than he had before. He who 
exerts any spiritual influence increases his store of 
spiritual power. 

The Gospel of Jesus, like this bread of the miracle, is 
sufficient for the moral and spiritual wants of the whole 
world. What can exhaust that which finds itself grow- 
ing only when it is used, and invariably multiplied by 
being divided ? 

THE GODLIKE CHRIST. 

What a picture of a God we have in the simple narra- 
tive of this miracle ! There is nothing to equal it in 
all Greek and Roman and oriental and modern litera- 
ture. The unconscious power of this poet, John, is 
admirable. He does not seem to know that in these 
nine verses he has written what no poet of any time or 
any land has been able to approach. But he has. It is 
impossible to conceive any description of the exertion of 
divine omnipotence moved by divine compassion more 
marvelously natural and supernatural than the story of 
this miracle as related by John and the other disciples. 
The passage in Genesis describing the creation in which 
the command was issued, " Light be I" and immediately 



118 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

' ' Light was ! " — a passage admired from the earliest days 
of criticism down to our own times — is surpassed by the 
account in the eleventh and twelfth verses of the sixth 
chapter of John. In the former there is apparent exer- 
tion ; in the latter there is mere volition without so 
much as speech. Humanity needs no God for time and 
eternity superior in any characteristic to the God whose 
omniscience, omnipotence, and goodness shine out in 
the story of the miraculous feeding of five thousand men 
with their women, and children. 

Yet while so many were fed, so few were converted. 

Perhaps some reader will say to himself that if he 
could only be eye-witness to such a scene he would yield 
to the sight and give homage to Jesus as the true repre- 
sentative of the theistic idea. No, you would not. If 
you have no such spiritual insight as permits you to see 
the Father in the Son as revealed in the Gospel, you 
could partake of the food which fed the five thousand, 
you could see the eyes of the blind flooded by streams of 
light, you could witness the cleansing of the leper, and 
even the raising of the dead, and Jesus would be to you 
only as "a, prophet that should come into the world." 
Even Philip, who heard the claim of Jesus and saw the 
water made wine at Cana, and was present at this mira- 
cle, and was with Jesus to the close of His career, on 
the last sorrowful night, the night before the crucifixion, 
wounded his Lord by asking to be shown the Father ! 
and had to be told that whoever had seen Jesus had seen 
the Father, that all that is visible of God can be seen in 
Jesus. 

Therefore, do not pray for a miracle, but for increased 
spiritual insight. 



VIII. 
2H)f dfooii ot SmmottaUtg. 



John VI. 

(26) Jesus answered them and said, " Verily, verily, I say unto 
you, Ye seek Me, not because ye saw signs, but because ye ate of 
the loaves, and were filled. (27) Work not for the meat which per- 
isheth, but for the meat which abideth unto eternal life, which the 
Son of man shall give unto you : for Him the Father, even God, 
hath sealed" [or, Him the Father has sealed as God]. (28) They 
said therefore unto Him, " What must we do, that we may work 
the works of God?" (29) Jesus answered and said unto them, 
"This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath 
sent." (30) They said therefore unto Him, "What, then, doest Thou 
for a sign, that we may see, and believe Thee? what workest Thou? 
(31) Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, 
He gave them bread out of heaven to eat. " (32) Jesus therefore 
said unto them, " Verily, verily, I say unto you, It was not Moses 
that gave you the bread out of heaven ; but My Father is giving 
you the true bread out of heaven. (33) For the bread of God is 
that which cometh down out of heaven, and is giving life unto the 
world." (34) They said therefore unto Him, " Lord, evermore give 
us this bread." (35) Jesus said unto them, " lam the bread of life: 
he that cometh to Me shall not hunger, and he that believeth on Me 
shall never thirst. (36) But I said unto you, that ye have seen Me, 
and yet believe not. (37) All that which the Father giveth Me shall 
come unto Me; and him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast 
out. (38) For I am come down from heaven, not to do Mine own 
will, but the will of Him that sent Me. (39) And this is the will 
of Him that sent Me, that of all that which He hath given Me I 
should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day. (40) 
For this is the will of My Father, that every one that beholdeth the 
Son, and believeth the Son, should have eternal life ; and I will 
raise him up at the last day. " 



THE FOOD OF IMMOKTALITY. 

THE CHRIST AGAIN DISAPPEARS. 

AFTER the miraculous feeding of the great multi- 
tude the people would have made Jesus king. But 
this was not in His scheme. So He retired from them 
into some recess of the mountain, and the disciples 
entered their boats to go to Capernaum. 

On that memorable night when they toiled in the 
darkness against the tempest, Jesus came walking to 
them on the sea and brought them to Capernaum. The 
people who would have made Him king had seen the 
departure of the disciples and the retiring of the Great 
Teacher. But the next morning when they could not 
find Jesus on the mountain and knew that He had not 
gone with the disciples when they started, they were 
naturally perplexed, and some of them took boats and 
went to Capernaum. Their desire to see Jesus again 
was unaffectedly strong. Some of them — perhaps not 
the best of them, perhaps the most carnal and secular 
of the crowd, many others perhaps having gone away 
carrying the seed of the kingdom in their hearts, — some 
of them pursued their search so far as to cross to Caper- 
naum, where they might find news of Jesus. 

They had no delicacy. They persecuted Jesus with 
their presence. They were not seeking spiritual help, 
but material comfort. " They hoped that He was to be 
their Bread-King, the Messiah to reign and feed them. 



122 THE GOSPEL OF SPLRITUAL IKSIGHT. 

Their hearts and consciences had all gone to stomach. " 
(" Light of the Nations/' p. 394.) 

These impertinent people, who were as destitute of 
delicate sensibility as they were of spiritual insight, 
immediately addressed themselves to Jesus, probably 
while He was teaching in the synagogue. It is to be 
noticed that their zeal was somewhat cooling, seeing that 
they now addressed Jesus merely as a teacher and not as 
a king, calling Him only "Kabbi." They questioned 
Him as to when and how He had eluded them and 
reached Capernaum. It was so strange a thing that 
probably they expected to be told of another miracle. 

A REPROACH, AN EXHORTATION, AND A PROMISE. 

But Jesus paid no attention to their question. His 
behavior here is godlike. God has never granted an- 
swer to any question suggested by either pruriency or 
curiosity. That is true through the whole body of 
revelation. The answers of the Spirit of God to the 
spirit of man are as to those things in which man's 
spiritual salvation is concerned. So Jesus showed them 
that He searched their hearts to the bottom. " Verily, 
verily, I say unto you, Ye seek Me not because of the 
miracles you saw, but because of the loaves you did eat." 
This seems to charge them with really sinking the spirit- 
ual in the material by failing to reach the invisible 
through the things that are seen. 

Jesus follows up these words of reproach with words 
of exhortation : " Exert yourself not so much for the 
bread which perisheth as for that bread which endureth 
to the life of eternity. " That a man should not put forth 
proper effort to provide the needful food for himself and 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 123 

family would be a teaching contrary to the whole tenor 
of the Christian Scriptures. St. Paul exhorts lazy 
people, " by our Lord Jesus Christ, that with quiet- 
ness they work, and eat their own bread." He goes fur- 
ther, and enjoins that those who will not work shall not 
eat (2 Thess. iii., 10-12). But, after all, bread and 
meat perish. If they are not eaten they corrupt and go 
into putrefaction. If eaten, much is thrown off as use- 
less excrement, and that which supplies the needs of the 
body does but support, for a little while, an organism 
which must soon perish. There is a spiritual life which 
may be perpetual. As the life of the body is supported 
by nourishment from without, so is the life of the spirit. 
As there is material meat, so there is spiritual meat. 

And a curious paradox seems involved in the words of 
the Master : the perishable meat must be wrought for 
laboriously, while the spiritual meat is given. And 
herein is the promise : " The Son of Man shall give you " 
that food. 

It was a very broad promise to be made by One who, 
in the very making, emphasizes His manhood. That 
emphasis of His brotherhood points to His sympathy 
with humanity, but He will not allow it to point away 
from His divinity. He is the Son of God while He is 
the Son of Man. "Him (the Son of Man) hath 
the Father sealed." As if He had said : The God 
whom you regard as the Giver of every good and perfect 
gift, to whom you go for all things, this "Father of 
eternity," as Isaiah calls Him, has set His seal to My 
claim to be equal with Him. " Him hath the Father 
sealed as God," appears to be the p roper translation of 
the close of the twenty-seventh verse. As the words 



124 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

stand in our common version there is violence done to 
their collocation in the original. What Jesus gives God 
the Father gives, and the Father never gives any thing 
without the Son, nor the Son without the Father. 

SOME SPIRITUAL LIGHT. 

There seemed to dawn upon them the idea that Jesus 
was specially claiming to be a great moral teacher, and 
that His miracles of bread-giving and the like were 
merely incidental. They seemed to begin to perceive 
that Jesus had a spiritual meaning in the word "food," 
and they began to have some desire to possess that 
food. Therefore they asked Him, in the spirit of their 
time, and perhaps with the feeling that they had been 
fairly faithful observers of their religion, " What shall 
we do that we might work the works of God ? " This 
did not mean the works which God performs, but the 
works which are pleasing to Him and are required by 
Him. So in their Scriptures it had been used, as in 
Jeremiah xlviii., 10, and so it was afterwards used in 
the New Testament Scriptures, as in 1 Cor. xv., 58. 
But their ritualistic habit comes forward in the plural 
of the word " works," and their Pharisaic trust to what 
they could "do" of themselves, as meriting and procur- 
ing salvation. 

Jesus corrected their mistakes by the statement, 
," This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him 
whom He hath sent." This is as fundamental as it is 
explicit. He corrects "works "by "work"; He substi- 
tutes belief for doing. This statement has in it the 
germ of the whole Gospel system, as afterward urged 
by Jesus Christ himself and presented by James, the 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 125 

brother of Jesus, and elaborated by Paul. There is just 
one thing necessary, namely: belief in Jesus Christ as 
the One to whom the spirit must be confided for time 
and eternity. This does not mean a mere assent of the 
intellect to the historic Christ, which may be in the 
most wicked men and devils, but a living and loving 
and powerful faith, which transforms the believer's 
character and produces, not dead, but living works. 

CREDENTIALS OF MESSIAHSHIP DEMANDED. 

His hearers understood Jesus as thus making the 
claim to Messiahship. They demanded of Him, there- 
fore, some sign in support of that claim. They had 
been fed with material bread from His hand, and that 
was a sign that He was a prophet come from God; but 
for His Messiahship they demanded something more. 
Was it that He should produce perpetual bread or pro- 
duce bread perpetually, in this new kingdom which He 
was setling up ? They could not take in the thought 
of a Saviour from sin working spiritually from within: 
that was too refined a thought for them. They had 
been so trained under law, by inheritance and environ- 
ment, that they had in their blood and in their spirits 
that idea of righteousness which makes it to consist in 
conforming externally to some command. Now Jesus 
teaches them that what God desires of them is to have 
such faith in Him as shall produce a new life from love, 
not from the rigid application of laws. And to believe 
God, to rest on Him, to refer every thing to Him, to do 
every right thing for love of Him, this is the manliest, 
noblest thing a rational being can do. 

They did not embrace this idea; it was too large for 



126 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

them. They could conceive nothing higher than a law- 
giver. So they demanded of Jesus some miracle which 
should establish His authority as a law-giver. Moses 
had led the people, and had delivered the law to them. 
His claim was established by a miracle the most stupen- 
dous known to them and their fathers. For decades of 
years he had fed the great multitude which had come 
out of Egypt with bread from heaven (Exodus xvi., 4; 
Psalms lxxviii., 24, and cv., 40). By the side of that 
"angels' food," what was the feeding of a few thousand 
just once, and with barley bread ? Let Him take care 
of them for a quarter of a century at least, if He would 
have them believe on Him. 

THE POWERLESSNESS OF MIRACLES. 

One is arrested by this fresh exhibition of the power- 
lessness of miracles to work moral and spiritual improve- 
ment. Their fathers had been fed for years and years 
with food which they saw every day miraculously pro- 
duced, with the weekly addition of the supplemental 
miracle of the production of double the amount on the 
sixth day and a suspension of the supply on the seventh, 
and yet every man of them had died an unbeliever in 
the wilderness. (See Exodus xvi.) Now Jesus had fed 
five thousand men, besides women and children, and 
there does not appear to have been a single soul brought 
nearer to God. And yet men are crying for miracles. 

These impertinent people backed up their reference to 
Moses by quoting Psalm lxxviii., 24 : "As it is written, 
He gave them bread from heaven. " To their "it is writ- 
ten " Jesus loftily replies with His solemn and decisive 
"Verily, verily, I say unto you." He does not deny the 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IXSIGHT. 127 

miracle of the manna, but He does deny that Moses gave 
it. ' ' It was not Moses that gave you that bread, but My 
Father," and by implication of what He had said before 
it was Himself that had given their fathers food for their 
bodies. "He gave" — "He gives." He gave material 
bread for the bodies of your fathers, He now gives you 
the " true bread," the substantial bread, the spiritual 
bread, not from the air from which the manna fell, but 
from the eternal heavens. The word " gave " pointed to 
the fact that that supply ceased. " He giveth," is giving, 
points to the continuance of the supply of the spiritual 
bread which has lasted through the centuries and to-day 
is quite as abundant as ever, for " the bread of God is 
that which cometh down from heaven and giveth life to 
the world." 

To this statement of Jesus the people replied, "Lord, 
ever give us this bread." It was just such an outburst 
as might have been expected from such a crowd. It re- 
minds us of the exclamation of the woman of Samaria, 
"Sir, give me this water." But there was probably less 
apprehension of the spiritual in them than in her ; for, 
although they were so impressed that they had ascended 
in their speech from "Eabbi" to " Lord/' yet even His 
high talk of something to eat kept their hearts in their 
stomachs. 

WHERE IS THE BREAD OF IMMORTALITY? 

Then said Jesus unto them plainly, "I am the bread 
of life ; he that cometh unto Me shall never hunger ; 
and he that belie veth on Me shall never thirst." Here 
one phrase involves the other. Coming to Jesus, turn- 
ing from all other saviors, is incomplete without believ- 



128 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

ing on Jesus as the only Saviour. In the body thirst 
follows the eating of the food which satisfies hunger. 
In the wilderness, after manna water was needed. 
" Hunger and thirst," in all times and in all languages, 
has been a phrase to imply intense desire. " Hunger- 
ing and thirsting after righteousness " means inexpressi- 
ble longing for goodness. He who reposes on Jesus has 
all his spiritual desires gratified and all his spiritual 
wants supplied, for that involves the reception of His 
doctrines and personality and the assimilation of both 
by the spirit, as bread is assimilated by the body. 

And then Jesus reminds them that they had seen Him 
and yet had not believed. Spiritual affinity was so want- 
ing, that even the presence of the Son of God and the 
sight of His miracles did not draw them unto Him. 
" Every thing which the Father giveth Me shall come 
to Me, and that which cometh unto Me I will in no wise 
cast out." This is the statement of a law in the spirit- 
ual world as broad as the general statement of such a law 
as that of gravitation in the natural world. " Every 
thing that has an affinity for Me comes to Me and I have 
an affinity for it " is what the Great Teacher seems to 
mean. 

A VERY GREAT COMFORT. 

That should be a very great comfort to all who have 
any tendency toward the Son of God, and a great en- 
couragement to cultivate that tendency. The general 
principle includes individuals as " whatsoeYer" includes 
"whosoever." Whosoever, of whatever age, or color, or 
sex, or nationality, or culture, or previous condition of 
spiritual servitude, or theological opinion, i ' the one com- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL IKSIGHT. 129 

ing to Me " is the description of the one received by Jesus. 
It is the spiritual law of gravitation. The earth receives 
whatever comes to it : a spray of a feather of a pinion of a 
humming-bird, the smallest atom of matter that is free 
to fall to it, as well as great towers and huge mountain- 
slides. So let no one say I have been so frivolous and 
vain, I have been so worldly and carnal, I have been 
such an atrocious criminal that I can never be saved. 
The coming to Christ and believing in Christ is the only 
thing requisite and necessary for salvation. All other 
things will follow from that real, sincere, and prompt 
coming and trust. The whole Godhead of the Father 
and the whole manhood of the Son are pledged for the 
salvation of the man who comes and trusts. 

That is confirmed and amplified in the next two verses 
(39, 40), which may be thus translated and paraphrased : 
" For I came down from heaven, not for the purpose of 
doing any voluntary thing which is separated from the 
will of Him that sent Me ; for what I am willing He is 
willing, and this is His will, and consequently My will, 
that I should not lose any thing which He hath given Me, 
but should raise it up at the last day." That is the 
universal end ; the method as to men is declared in the 
next sentence : " And this is the will of My Father, 
that every one who sees the Son and believes in the Son 
should have perpetual life, and I should raise him up at 
the last day." This frees the whole spiritual government 
of God from the suspicion of capriciousness. Faith in 
Jesus Christ is the only spiritual process by which any 
man can secure that spiritual life which can endure all 
the trials and strains of all the eternities. 

Here is a clear and positive announcement that ever- 



130 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

lasting life, eternal life, immortal life, endless life, what- 
ever you choose to call that mode of spiritual existence 
which is indispensable for existence after the last day, 
that that comes only from faith in Jesus Christ, and that 
all who have spiritual insight have life everlasting, and 
those who do not have and will not have spiritual 
insight have not and will not have everlasting life but 
must be lost. 



IX. 
Gfyt Wtink oUtmmortalttg. 



John VII. 

(37) Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood 
and cried, saying, ' 'If any man thirst, let him come unto Me, and 
drink. (38) He that believeth on Me, as the Scripture hath said, out 
of his belly shall flow rivers of living water." (39) But this spake 
He of the Spirit, which they that believed on Him were to receive: 
for the Spirit was not yet given; because Jesus was not yet glorified. 
(40) Some of the multitude therefore, when they heard these words, 
said, " This is of a truth the prophet." (41) Others said, "This is 
the Christ." But some said, "What, doth the Christ come out of Gal- 
ilee t (42) Hath not the Scripture said that the Christ cometh of the 
seed of David, and from Bethlehem, the village where David was? " 
(43) So there arose a division in the multitude because of Him. (44) 
And some of them would have taken Him ; but no man laid hands 
on Him. 



THE DRINK OF IMMORTALITY. 

FEAST OF TABERNACLES.* 

THE Feast of Tabernacles was celebrated in the 
autumn, when the heats were abated and the rains 
were not begun. The harvest had been gathered, and 
the Day of Atonement had just passed. In the fullness 
of their garners, and in the sense of freedom from the 
guilt of their sins, the whole people rejoiced together. 
Moreover, it was a joyful celebration of a sad passage 
in the early history of their nation, when their fathers 
had dwelt in booths in the wilderness, and even Jehovah's 
sanctuary was in a tent. 

From all parts of the land, and even from many for- 
eign parts, the devout poured into the Holy City. No 
good Jew allowed himself to sleep in a house. Boughs 
full of green leaves were brought from the country, and 
temporary booths constructed on house-tops and along 
thoroughfares, and in all the environs of the city, until 
Jerusalem was covered with a temporary forest. Glad- 
ness reigned, and public and private rejoicing prevailed. 

The Temple service partook of the festal air of the 
occasion. Immediately after the regular morning sacri- 
fices, every day, a priest went with a golden vessel to 
the fountain of Siloam, on the side of the hill on which 
the Temple stood, and drew water, which he brought 
through the water-gate, accompanied by a gay procession 

* Several paragraphs in the earlier portion of this chapter have been taken 
from the author's " The Light of the Nations." 



134 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL IHSIGHT. 

and the sound of trumpets, and having mixed it with 
wine, poured it on the sacrifice upon the altar amid the 
hallelujah shouts of the people. This probably reminded 
them of the supplies of water Jehovah had given to 
their fathers in the emergencies of the wilderness. The 
joyfulness of this ceremonial was so great that it passed 
into a common proverb : " He that never saw the rejoic- 
ing of drawing water never saw rejoicing in all his life." 

THE SUPPLEMENTAL FESTIVAL. 

The legal limit of the "Feast of Tabernacles" was 
seven days, but it was followed on the eighth day by a 
supplemental festival of rejoicing, especially over the 
ingathered crops, their corn and their wine. This was 
a day of special jollity, from which Jennings suggests 
that the heathen borrowed their saturnalia. 

It was to this gayest of all festivals that the men of- 
the nation were gathering. But over all there was a 
shadow. The wonderful words and works of Jesus had 
spread themselves through the land. The mission of 
the Seventy had freshly excited public attention. Every 
man had something to tell or to hear of what Jesus had 
been saying or doing. Misrepresentations and exagger- 
ations were, of course, rife. Opinions differed. Parties 
were beginning to crystallize. Some were for Him, 
some against. The latter were more and stronger than 
the former, whose favorable opinion of Jesus we find 
much modified by the pressure of public sentiment. 
They said, " He is a good man," while the others said, 
"Nay, He deceives the people." His friends did not 
dare to render a frank expression of their views of His 
character and His operations. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 135 

THE SUDDEN APPEARANCE OP JESUS. 

Suddenly, in the midst of the feast, Jesus appeared in 
the Temple and began to teach. It was like an appari- 
tion. 

What course He had come they knew not. He was 
not at the beginning of the feast. His absence had 
occasioned much anxious speculation upon the part of 
friends and foes. The days were going by, and He did 
not come. But perhaps on Wednesday, the fourth day 
of the feast, when expectation of His coming had begun 
to flag, He calmly walked into the Temple, took His 
position, and began to unfold His doctrine as if nothing 
unusual had occurred, as if His friends were not intense- 
ly anxious for His safety, and as if His foes had not 
been forming plots to compass His destruction. He 
went amply with wide knowledge, and powerfully with 
great authority, into His discourses. The Jews listened, 
and were amazed, and started the inquiry, " How does 
this man know letters, never having learned ? " They 
intended to disparage Him by calling the attention of 
the people to the fact that He had not received Rabbini- 
cal instruction. The intention was to create popular 
prejudice against Him, as if He were an interloper, not 
being a graduate of the schools, not being in the suc- 
cession of the priests. 

THE GREAT DAY OF THE FEAST. 

The " Feast of the Tabernacles," strictly speaking, 
closed at the end of the seventh day ; but on the eighth 
day was a supplementary festival which concluded the 
whole, and which was " the great day of the feast." On 



136 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

the other days the priests, as we have seen, went to the 
fount of Siloam and drew water, which was brought 
with great rejoicing into the Temple. This ceremonial 
was omitted on the eighth day. The seven days repre- 
sented the wandering, the eighth, the entrance into the 
land of rest, the nation's home. The water came to 
represent in symbol the Holy Thirst of God. It had 
been always a fact to notice that there was no fountain 
within the Temple limits on Mount Moriah. This was 
interpreted to signify that the refreshing spirit was 
lacking in their dry ecclesiasticism, and the gift of that 
spirit, like the opening of a fountain, was among the 
most precious promises of prophecy. Joel (iii., 18) 
foretold that it should come forth from the House of 
the Lord, and Ezekiel (xlvii.) describes its breaking 
forth from under the threshold of the Temple. It was 
the great expectation of the spiritually-minded Jews, 
and most probably was constantly associated in their 
minds with other unspeakable benedictions which should 
come with the Messiah. 

THE GREAT INVITATION. 

It was on that eighth day that Jesus took occasion to 
use the circumstances and ceremonials of the feast to 
proclaim Himself as the personal object of saving faith, 
and to publish the great Gospel invitation. The reve- 
lation of His Messiahship made to the solitary woman at 
the well in Samaria was now proclaimed to all the peo- 
ple of Israel in the Temple. % 

His manner of delivery is intimated. If before He 
had been sitting and calmly teaching the people, now 
He stood up and with a voice raised to a higher pitch 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 137 

by the occasion, by His intenseness of feeling, and by 
the importance of His announcement, He cried: " If 
any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink. He 
that believeth on Me, as the Scripture hath said, out of 
his belly shall flow rivers of living water." 

The people must have listened intently. Thirst is 
perhaps the most exigient, exacting, tormenting of hu- 
man wants. It is universal; so universal that in all 
languages it is used as the most striking possible repre- 
sentation of any want felt at any time by any human 
being. In the East the scarcity of water increases its 
force as a representation of that which most satisfies. 
As the thirst of the spirit is more pressing and subtle 
and fierce than the thirst of the body, the Jewish Script- 
ures would naturally more frequently and more impress- 
ively employ it in appeals to men to find the water of 
life. And so wherever the Scriptures are known men 
have become familiar with this idea. 

At the feast at which Jesus was speaking the water 
had been brought into the Temple and poured out dur- 
ing the preceding seven days. On the great concluding 
day, at the time of the morning sacrifice, a priest, from 
a golden pitcher, poured water that had been brought 
from Siloam, together with wine, into two perforated 
vessels on the west side of the altar, while the people 
sang: " With joy shall ye draw ivater from the tvells 
of salvation" (Isaiah xii., 3). Then the libations 
ceased. There was no more pouring forth of water at 
that great feast. The ceremony had ended; the ritual 
had been accomplished. Yet there were scores of souls 
there, as there are everywhere in large congregations 
assembled to worship, scores of souls who felt a still 



138 THE GOSPEL OE SPIMTUAL INSIGHT. 

unsatisfied spiritual thirst. To their spiritual insight 
the environment must have served to render more man- 
ifest and more significant the saying of Jesus, to which 
their spiritual sense of need would direct their attention. 

WHAT THE INVITATION INCLUDED. 

In the invitation several things are included. First 
of all, there must be a sincere thirst. Nothing that is not 
thirsted for can be regarded as greatly desirable. Then 
there must be knowledge of the fountain from which 
flows that which will satisfy. Men may construct cis- 
terns which may receive the seepings of the high places 
or the drippings of the atmosphere of this world, but 
they will hold stagnant, not living water. And those 
cisterns may become broken, as cisterns of men gener- 
ally do, and so even those stagnant waters will run out. 
But Jesus Christ is an enduring fountain, whose water 
never fails. When pleasure, money, fame, power, place, 
all the waters the world offers, fail us, then the living, 
that is, the flowing, water from Christ will satisfy us. 

"Believing on" Jesus explains "coming to " Jesus. 
To be in spiritual need is to be thirsty; to believe is to 
drink that which assuages the thirst. But whosoever 
really drinks of this fountain finds himself become a 
fountain. His resources are within himself. He does 
not have to go to any Siloam for water. He can not be 
separated from the source of his satisfaction. 

Nay, more: out of him, out of his heart, for that is 
what the word belly here means, "shall flow rivers of 
living water." Can any thing be better than the words 
of Chrysostom ? He calls attention to the plural. 
" Rivers, not a river, to show the copious and overflow- 



THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 139 

ing power of grace, and living water — that is, always 
moving; for when the grace of the Spirit has entered 
into and settled in the mind, it flows more freely than 
any fountain, and neither fails, nor empties, nor stag- 
nates. The wisdom of Stephen, the tongue of Peter, 
and the strength of Paul are evidences of this. Nothing 
hindered them; but, like impetuous torrents, they went 
on, carrying every thing along with them." And so 
will it be with every Christian in proportion as he has 
spiritual insight into the words of Jesus and practically 
makes use of this divine Fountain of living water. 

In His invitation Jesus said, " as the Scripture hath 
said." Any precise representative of this apparent quo- 
tation has not been found in the Old Testament. It 
seems to be a phrase collecting in itself all the sayings 
of the Sacred Scriptures in any wise pointing to the cer- 
emonials of this feast, or to the truth of God as a flow- 
ing refreshment to those who are spiritually thirsty. 
These are abundant, and the reader will find profit in 
culling out and devoutly studying, in addition to pas- 
sages already quoted, such others as these: Isaiah xliv., 
3, and lv., 1, and lviii., 11; Ezekiel xlvii., 1; Joel ii., 
23; Zechariah xiii., 1, and xiv., 8; Jeremiah ii., 13; 
Proverbs iv., 23, and x., 11. 

HE WAS SPEAKING OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. 

We are told "that Jesus spake of the Spirit which they 
that believe on Him should receive, for the Holy Ghost 
was not yet given, because that Jesus was not glorified." 
It is plain that the Holy Ghost not only had been, but 
had been operating at the creation of the world and at 
the birth of Jesus, and had appeared when the Messiah- 



140 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

ship of Jesus had been recognized at His baptism; bat 
He had not been revealed to the whole world. It was 
first the revelation of the Father, then the revelation of 
the Son, then, and now, the revelation of the Holy 
Ghost. The glorification of Jesus, by His crucifixion, 
resurrection, and ascension, made way for the Holy 
Spirit, whose residence in the church is an abiding pres- 
ence of the spirit of Jesus, and whose residence in indi- 
vidual believers is their witness in them of the redemp- 
tion and sancification which they have through the 
Word. 

The results of the great festal sermon are briefly 
stated. The people became divided in opinion. Some 
were for Him, admitting that He was a prophet, and 
some supposed that they were going much further by 
suggesting that He might be the very Christ. But 
others opposed both suppositions, because the Scriptures 
nowhere mentioned the coming of Christ out of Galilee, 
but do assign His place of birth to Bethlehem. And 
the division was so fierce that the people would have 
aided the emissaries of the Council, if there had not 
been something about Him which paralyzed every effort 
to lay hold upon Him. But who saw and accepted the 
Christ of God? 



X. 
Spiritual Hhteage. 



John VIII. 

(31) Jesus therefore said to those Jews which had believed Him, 
"If ye abide in My word, then are ye truly My disciples; (32) 
and ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free." 
(33) They ansicered unto Him, " We be Abraham's seed, and have 
never yet been in bondage to any man: how say est Thou, Ye shall be 
made free?" (34) Jesus answered them, " Verily, verily, I say unto 
you, Every one that committeth sin is the bond-servant of sin. (35) 
And the bond-servant abideth not in the house forever ; the Son abi- 
deth forever. (36) If therefore the Son shall make you free, ye shall 
be free indeed. (37) I know that ye are Abraham's seed ; yet ye seek 
to kill Me, because My word hath not free course in you. (38) I 
speak the things which I have seen with My Father ; and ye also do 
the things which ye heard from your father." (39) They answered 
and said unto Him, <e Our father is Abraham." Jesus saith unto 
them, " If ye were Abraham's children, ye would do the works of 
Abraham. (40) But note ye seek to kill Me, a man that hath told 
you the truth, which I heard from God: this did not Abraham. (41) 
Ye do the works of your father." They said unto Him, " We were 
not born of fornication; we have one Father, even God." (42) Jesus 
said unto them, " If God were your Father, ye would love Me: for 
I came forth and am come from God ; for neither have I come of 
Myself, but He sent Me. (43) Why do ye not understand My speech ? 
Even because ye can not hear My word. (44) Ye are of your father 
the devil, and the lusts of your father it is your will to do. He was 
a murderer from the beginning, and stood not in the truth, because 
there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his 
own ; for he is a liar, and the father thereof. (45) But because I say 
the truth, ye believe Me not. (46) Which of you convicteth Me of 
sin? If I say truth, why do ye not believe Me ? (47) He that is of 
God heareth the words of God : for this cause ye hear them not, be- 
cause ye are not of God." 



SPIKITTIAL LINEAGE. 

"NEVER MAN SPAKE LIKE THIS MAN." 

THE seventh day of the great feast, the Feast of 
Tabernacles, had closed. The constables who had 
been sent by the Sanhedrim to arrest Jesus had failed. 
When they arrived without Him, in reply to the question 
of their employers why they had not brought Him they 
replied . " Never man spake like this Man." It required 
little spiritual insight to perceive that. Upon this fol- 
lowed an angry discussion, which was closed by the sen- 
sible suggestion of Nicodemus : " Doth our law judge any 
man before it hear him and know what he doeth ? " and 
the taunt which it evoked, "Art thou also of Galilee ?" 
Perhaps no more unfortunate mistake ever occurred in 
the division of the Gospel into chapters and verses than 
that which separated the fifty- third verse of t>he seventh 
from the first verse of the eighth chapter Of John. You 
close one chapter by reading that " every man went into 
his own house." Next day you resume you# reading and 
begin the next chapter with "Jesus went to the Mount 
of Olives," which seems to have nothing especially to do 
with the narrative which follows. But attach the first 
sentence of the eighth chapter to the last of the seventh, 
and this is the reading : " Every man went unto his own 
house ; Jesus went to the Mount of Olives." There is a 
profound pathos in the collocation of the statements. 
After the festivities of the populace, after the hot and 
bitter pursuit of Jesus by the ecclesiastical authorities, 



144 THE GOSPEL OF SPITUTUAL INSIGHT. 

the people and the members of the Sanhedrim had their 
homes for a retreat, bnt the Son of Man went out alone 
to the cold mountains and the midnight air. 

But the next morning He was early in the Temple and 
there occurred the touching incident of the woman taken 
in the act of adultery. The feast was nearly over, but 
many remained and Jesus still taught. The night be- 
fore, the huge candelabra, which represented the pillar of 
fire which had guided their fathers through the wilder- 
ness, had been giving light. It was now extinguished. 
It may have been in allusion to that that Jesus said, " I 
am the Light of the world ! " He invited the world to 
follow Him. This induced His enemies to attack Him. 
His reply was so spirited, so elevated, so consistent with 
what their Messiah should be as to induce many of the 
Jews to become disposed to believe on Him. 

To these Jews He made an address which may well be 
a subject for study to all His disciples in all time. It is 
the test of willingness to continue in the discipleship of 
Jesus. Ifc is this : " If ye continue in My word, then are 
ye My disciples indeed ; and you will know the truth, 
and the truth Avill emancipate you " (vs. 31). 

WHAT IT IS TO BE A DISCIPLE. 

There may be the appearance of being a disciple in one 
who is not a disciple. One may be a disciple in mere ad- 
herence to the company of disciples. One may go further 
and actually believe in our Lord, in all that He claims 
for Himself as the Son of God, the Light of the world, 
the Bread and Water of life, and yet not be a disciple in 
the sense of being a learner. One may even go so far as 
to receive into his intellect much doctrinal and ethical 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 145 

teaching from Christ. But he only is the true disciple 
who studies every word of Jesus for the purpose of bring- 
ing it to operate on his own life. A man may plunge 
into the sea and swim awhile, but he can not "abide," 
he can not " continue " therein as a fish can. A fish may 
leap from the water and be a short while in the air, but 
it can not "abide," it can not " continue " therein as a 
bird can. There is such a thing as a "flying fish," but 
it is not a " true " bird, a bird "indeed." So, if we are 
to be Christ's disciples indeed, we must be able to make 
our home in the word of Christ ; our spirits must drink 
in that word as our bodies inhale the atmosphere. 

All along through this discourse of our Lord there 
was a thread of high spiritual thought, of which we 
must not lose sight while engaged with the details. 

THE LOVE OF FREEDOM. 

In the address of Christ there is an appeal to the love 
of freedom which seems so natural to our humanity. 
Men make mistakes about its nature, and about its use, 
and especially about the way to secure it, but in all ages, 
among people of all kinds of culture, from birth to 
death, the cry of the soul is for freedom. Almost the 
first indication of rationality in a human babe is its 
impatience of control, and from that to the highest 
human literature and the loftiest flight of human song 
and the widest sweep of human eloquence, the silent en- 
durance, the sighing, the moaning, the praying, the 
toiling, the fighting, the shouting for freedom, have 
made the most noteworthy portion of human history. It 
has been physical freedom, and intellectual freedom, 
and social freedom, and civil freedom. 



146 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

When any sentiment is so deeply imbedded, so vigor- 
ous, so persistent, and so universal, we may well pause 
to inquire its cause and its source. May it not come 
from our divine origin ? God is free. It is impossible 
to think of God under any restrictive conditions. If, in 
any sense, man be a child of God, he must inherit some 
of the traits of his paternity. Perhaps the most conspicu- 
ous of these is his original freedom of will. In that man is 
most godlike. Nothing outside the will can enslave the 
will. It may surrender itself, but neither God nor the 
devil could compel it against itself. 

Just in proportion as freedom is unspeakably desirable 
is slavery unspeakably detestable to our human nature. 
The lowest state to which a human being can fall, it is 
generally supposed, is slavery. No taunt of reproach 
can go deeper than the charge against a man that he is 
willingly a slave. No appeal to men of high character 
is so powerful as that which stirs them to resist or to 
throw off slavery. 

THE CHRIST'S APPEAL TO THAT LOVE. 

It was to this ineffaceable trait of human nature that 
Jesus appealed in His discourses. They would be free, 
those Jews who had an impulse to add themselves to the 
number of His followers. They felt the Roman yoke 
intolerable, they longed for the coming of some one of 
their own people who might break that yoke. Every 
claimant, therefore, had some hearing. Here was a 
young man, risen out of Galilee, it is true, but speaking 
as never man spake, and doing such wonderful things as 
to create the suspicion that He might be the Messiah. 
Could He not secure their freedom ? Might there not 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 147 

reside in Him some genius for conquest and government 
which would enable Him to make them conquerors of 
their masters and bring Rome to the feet of Jerusalem ? 
Such probably was their idea. Their own personal en- 
slavement to their lusts and passions and prejudices, 
which had degraded them from their high estate of being 
the leaders and teachers of the nations to the low condi- 
tion of being the vilest people on the face of the earth, 
had never given a pang of pain or shame. Their very 
ideal of freedom was base. 

But not so with Jesus. " Free" : that word touched 
the top of thought, as He saw it. Free ! That is what 
God is ! Free ! That is to be far above whatever can 
weaken or degrade or destroy. Such freedom can not 
be merely of the body or of the intellect ; it can not 
have reference merely to one's surroundings. It must 
be in the inmost man ; it must reside in the spirit. Such 
spiritual freedom from all bewildering error, from all 
enslaving forces of evil, is the loftiest ideal. Indeed, 
nothing is evil that does not enslave the spirit, and 
nothing is good that does not promote the freedom of 
the spirit. God's eternal joy and goodness is in His 
perfect freedom. 

This, then, is that to which we should aspire. None 
of us have ever enjoyed God's perfect freedom for a 
single hour, and perhaps we never can while in the 
flesh. But it is the ideal toward which we must be 
constantly working while always aspiring. We may 
thus attain a freedom so like God's, that it may be for 
us human beings what God's freedom is for Him. What 
can make us free ? Can any thing without us, any mere 
mission, any certificate of membership in any guild, 



148 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

ecclesiastical or other ? No. It must be wrought within. 
" The truth will make you free/' said Jesus. It is the 
absence of heat which makes cold ; it is the absence of 
light which makes darkness ; it is the absence of truth 
that makes slavery. Then, the presence of truth makes 
freedom ? Precisely so. " You will know the truth, 
and the truth will make you free." 

KNOWING THE TRUTH. 

But how am I to "know the truth" ? Surely Jesus 
meant something deeper than the mere perception of 
the relation of terms, than the mere acceptance of prop- 
ositions, than mere intellectual orthodoxy. He was 
addressing those who, under the excitement of His 
speech, had felt disposed to associate with Him and His 
friends, but who had no high ideal and no deep spiritual 
thirst. He shows that to be one of His disciples, more 
is necessary than merely to be captivated in the imagina- 
tion by either Christ's speech or personality. " If you 
remain in My word, make yourself at home in My mode 
of thought, and carry My teaching into your practical 
every-day life, then ye are My disciples truly." 

This, then, seems to be the teaching of Jesus. He 
claims not the place of Rabbi so much as that of Lord. 
He comes to govern as well as to teach. I must take 
His word, that which contains His thought, as the par- 
amount law of my life, I must obey it, all of it, alto- 
gether, always. There is to be no questioning it. There 
is, of course, then, to be no comparing of it with any 
other utterances. It is to be not only the supreme, but 
the one and only rule of my whole inner and outer life. 
Living in it, making it my life's home, abiding in it, I 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 149 

shall know the truth and the truth shall emancipate me 
from spiritual slavery. 

CONSISTENT PHILOSOPHY. 

Profoundly consistent is this teaching with our best 
philosophic analysis of the working of human nature 
and our usual practice in all departments except relig- 
ion. TJiere we go upon the supposition if we can first 
free ourselves we shall be able to learn the truth and 
that knowledge of the truth shall make us good. This 
is not true according to Jesus, nor is it our own method 
in other departments. A child is not first taught math- 
ematical truth and then set to working sums, but the 
contrary. And in his beginning he does not believe 
that two and two make four because he knows it, but he 
knows it because he believes it. The beginning of Sir 
Isaac Newton's mathematical education lay in the fact 
that he believed when he was told that twice two always 
would be four. All a man's knoiuledge simply is so 
much of his belief as his intellect uses. 

Do men become good by being orthodox ? No. But 
they do become orthodox by being good. Does the cul- 
tivation of the intellect make the life good ? No. But 
an earnest effort to purify the heart always quickens and 
improves the intellect. What time many men do waste 
in preparing themselves for virtuous living by striving 
to find answers to profound metaphysical questions ! 
How many men deceive themselves by supposing that 
they wish to be free from sin and that they wish to 
know the truth. And they confirm themselves in this 
error by reading all they can against Jesus and Chris- 
tianity on the ground of hearing the other side ! It is all 



150 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

a mistake. No man now living who has read the Gospel 
or even heard much of Jesus is an infidel except upon 
choice. Jesus has declared that to be His disciple a 
man has only to continue in His word. With great or 
little intellect any man can do that, and no man has 
ever done that who has not come into the radiance of 
truth and the splendor of spiritual freedom. 

THE CURE FOR INFIDELITY. 

The cure for infidelity is obedience. No matter what 
a man may think or not think of Jesus, let him begin 
at the beginning of the Gospel and go to the end, step 
by step, day by day, asking what Jesus would have him 
do, and doing it with all his might, conscientiously, per- 
sistently, regardless of the consequences, and he will not 
only make a good life, but he will believe all he ought 
to believe, of Jesus, of humanity, of divinity, of things 
temporal and of things eternal. Orthodoxy may not 
always produce orthopraxy, but right living is always a 
very great help to right thinking. Very profound, very 
lofty, very wide is the saying of Jesus, " If ye continue 
in My truth ye are My disciples indeed; and ye will 
know the truth and the truth will make you free." 

So besotted were the hearers of Jesus, that they drew 
all His high sayings down to the plane of material things. 
His very attempt to teach them how to ascend aroused 
their resentment, and they replied that they regarded 
His speech as enigmatical, if not impertinent. They 
were Abraham's descendants, "were never in slavery to 
any man." So blinding is sin ! They forgot that their 
fathers had been in captivity in Egypt and in Babylon; 
they forgot that at that very moment and in their own 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIIUTUAL INSIGHT. 151 

land they were subjugated by Rome, by whose sufferance 
they remained in Palestine under the merest " semblance 
of political independence." 

THE SLAVERY OF SIN. 

But Jesus waived this foolish reply of theirs, and 
recalled them to the fact that He was speaking of spirit- 
ual things. With His emphatic and solemn mode of 
introducing His most important asseverations, He said: 
" Verily, verily, I say unto you, every one who practices 
sin is sin's slave." That is the statement of a tremen- 
dous reality. It refutes the vain belief of many a man 
that sin is the sinner's slave, to serve the sinner and to 
bring him pleasure and gain. 

He connects with this a certain consequence : " The 
slave is not at home in the house in perpetuity." He is 
liable to be sent away. But (i the Son is at home in 
perpetuity." You can not of yourself secure your place 
in the Father's house ; but the Son, who is the heir, 
and can no more be cast out than can the Father, He is 
able to give you the freedom of God's home. " If He 
shall make you free you shall be free indeed." That is, 
you shall not have the semblance of being at home : you 
shall enjoy the reality, and not temporarily and uncer- 
tainly ; but as the Son remains forever, so also those to 
whom He gives the freedom of the house will remain 
for ever. 

SPIRITUAL PATERNITY AND HEREDITY. 

Then Jesus called their attention to spiritual pater- 
nity and heredity, as distinguished from that which is 
merely physical. He knew that according to the flesh 



152 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

they were of Abraham's seed, but spiritually they were 
the devil's children, they were sin's slaves. They 
exhibited in their character and lives the spiritual linea- 
ments which showed their spiritual lineage. And He 
did the same in His. They made manifest who their 
father was by their spiritual physiognomy ; He did the 
same. He spoke the things that pleased God ; they did 
the things which pleased the devil. Plainly Jesus 
believed as certainly in a personal devil as He did in that 
of a personal Csesar. To Him the devil was no Persian 
myth, no merely poetically personified " tendency " : he 
was a real person. 

Those who were listening to Jesus had felt an impulse 
to become His disciples, but they had gone back and 
were ready to co-operate with those who were seeking to 
kill Him, whose only fault was that He had told them 
the truth of God. At first they had seemed about 
to surrender to His demands and yield their hearts like 
a conquered kingdom ; and like troops, some of His 
words had found a little place in them, but His word 
had not overspread their hearts, as troops might over- 
spread a conquered territory (vs. 37). So they had 
returned to their murderous disposition. So it is to this 
day. Men hear Christ preached and are somewhat 
charmed ; but they do not set themselves to bringing 
their lives into perfect subjection to the Lord, and so 
they go back to their old master, sin. 

FATHER ABRAHAM. 

These Jews retorted that Abraham was their father. 
Jesus had already admitted that after the flesh this was. 
so ; but He denied that it was true spiritually. " If you 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 153 

were Abraham's children you would do Abraham's 
works." The argument is that they did not the works 
that Abraham did, so that there was nothing in their 
walk or talk or other spiritual indication to suggest their 
spiritual descent from Abraham. Abraham loved the 
truth and received the truth, but they were about to 
kill a man for bringing them God's truth. This did not 
Abraham. Nevertheless, He admits that He did see 
their likeness to their father, but that father most cer- 
tainly was not Abraham. 

They began to perceive that Christ's discourse was 
spiritual. That led them to declare that God was their 
father; but they rested the claim to this sonship on the 
fact that they were Abraham's seed, so blind were they 
as not to see that spiritual kinship can not have physical 
basis. To show then the baselessness of this claim He 
points to the fact that they did not love Him, and to the 
general truth, which is true in this day as in theirs, 
that whoso knows Jesus and does not love Him can make 
no good claim to any spiritual kinship with God. That 
is the ethical, spiritual test. Every man's character is 
measured by his love for Jesus of Nazareth. 

It was very disheartening. No wonder Jesus exclaimed 
so pathetically, "Why do you not understand My 
idiom?" And answered His own question by, u Be- 
cause you are not able to hear My discourse." They 
had rendered themselves spiritually incapable of receiv- 
ing the matter of His discourse, and so the spiritually 
idiomatic phrases were distorted. Their whole spiritual 
nature had become false. They were so the children of 
the lying, murderous devil that they were color-blind to 
truth. They could receive a lie, but had no room for 



154 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 

truth. They had no spiritual connection with God, 
and therefore could not receive the truth. 

TWO TEST QUESTIONS. 

The two questions of Jesus, which the Jews could not 
answer, remain for the world, through all the subsequent 
ages, nailed up at the door of every church, school, 
court-house, and chamber of Christendom. They have 
been read by saint and sinner, by boor and courtier, by 
scholar and ignoramus, by king and peasant, by poet 
and philosopher. Here they are : 

1. " Which of you convicteth Me of any sin ?" 
Pilate examined Him and solemnly averred, ' ' I find 

no fault in Him." And century after century the most 
acute and robust intellects have stood up before the 
superb personality of Jesus and heard the challenge 
question of Jesus, and every thinker and speaker whose 
thought and speech have commanded the respect of the 
world has responded : " The verdict of Pilate is my 
verdict : I also find no fault in Him." 

2. " Then, if the truth is what I speak, what is the 
ground of your disbelief ? " 

No man, in any Christian century, has been able to 
point to a single inch of rational ground on which the 
rejection of Jesus can be placed. They may make faces 
at Him. They may be scurrilous and call Him a Samari- 
tan, a Jew, and a devil, but when He confronts them, as 
He will do wherever they are, living or dying or dead, 
with, "Why do you disbelieve Me?" they must be 
silent forever, even when silence must prove forever their 
confusion and their damnation. 






XL 
j5tgJ)t anir $nsigi)t. 



John IX. 

(1) And as He passed by, He saw a man blind from Ms birth. (2) 
And His disciples asked Him, saying, " Rabbi, who did sin, this man, 
or his parents, that he should be born blind t " (3) Jesus answered, 
" Neither did this man sin, nor his parents: but that the works of 
God should be made manifest in him. (4) We must work the works 
of Him that sent Me, while it is day: the night eometh, when no man 
can work. (5) When lam in the world, lam the light of the world." 
(6) When He had thus spoken, He spat on the ground, and made 
clay of the spittle, and anointed his eyes with the clay, (7) and 
said unto him, "Go, wash in the pool ofSiloam " (which is by interpre- 
tation, Sent). He went away therefore, and washed, and came 
seeing. (8) The neighbors therefore, and they which saw him afore- 
time, that he was a beggar, said, ' ' Is not this he that sat and begged ? " 
(9) Others said, " It is he''': others said, " No, but he is like him. " 
He said, "lam he." (10) They said therefore unto him, "How 
then were thine eyes opened? " (11) He answered, " The man that 
is called Jesus made clay, and anointed mine eyes, and said unto me, 
Goto Siloam, and wash: so I went away and washed, and I re- 
ceived sight. " (35) Jesus heard that they had cast him out ; and find- 
ing him, He said, " Host thou believe on the Son of God f " (36) He 
answered and said, " And who is He, Lord, that I may believe on 
Him ? " (37) Jesus said unto him, " Thou hast both seen Him, and 
He it is that speaketh with thee." 



SIGHT AND INSIGHT. 



A BLIND MAN. 



THEY had taken up stones to stone Him, those eccle- 
siastical foes of Jesus. His positive, high talk 
had exasperated them; and when He declared, as 
regarded the venerated father of their race: "Verily, 
verily, I say unto you, before Abraham was I am," thus 
not only taking precedence of Abraham, but applying 
to Himself the name of Jehovah, He seemed to them a 
blasphemer, and they began to stone Him. He escaped 
and went away. 

As He was walking along, apparently incidentally He 
saw a blind man. Nothing is more common in the 
East than diseases of the eyes. Blind beggars were 
usual spectacles in Jerusalem. This man had been blind 
from his birth, and probably a beggar all his life, and 
was personally well known to very many of the inhabi- 
tants. Perhaps the disciples and Jesus had seen him 
before. But to-day Jesus, the hated, hunted Jesus, the 
rejected prophet, may have given the beggar a look of 
unusual compassion. Ordinarily our troubles and 
sufferings make us selfish. The grandeur of Jesus 
is that His own distress did not draw His love in 
from humanity, but rather intensified His tenderness. 
Perhaps we have all longed to know just the expression 
on the face of Jesus as He bent His eyes, still probably 
flashing from the excitement of the late controversy, 
down on the sightless balls of the poor beggar by the 



158 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

wayside. It must have been peculiar, as it averted the 
attention of the disciples. 

BLIND AND "BORN BLIND." 

It is interesting to note the difference in the feelings 
of the disciples and those of Jesus at the contemplation 
of a man who had been born blind. 

Perhaps the disciples revolved in their minds the deep 
seriousness of congenital sightlessness. It is an incon- 
venience, a difficulty, an embarrassment, to be deprived 
of sight under any circumstances. But if a man has 
had the use of vision through the first years of his 
existence, it will have furnished him with pictures of 
sky and land and sea, of the works of art and human 
forces — pictures hung up in his memory, pictures he 
can revisit and retouch with the pencil of imagination, 
pictures to relieve the monotony of a life which can add 
nothing more to the stores that can be gathered by the 
sense of sight. 

But to him who has been born blind there are no such 
resources. He has never seen the bloom of a flower, or 
the flash of a bird's wing, or the motion of a running 
horse, or the wide plain, or the grand mountain, or the 
flowing stream, or the beautiful and noble works of 
architecture, or the immense ocean, or the " brave o'er- 
hanging " vault of heaven. The arch smile of a little 
child, the delicate tint of a maiden's blush, the beauty 
of the human eye, and even his mother's face — the thing 
that stands apart from all other sights, because each 
man's mother's look is something different from all the 
other looks of all the other mothers in the world — all 
these are things of which he knows no more than does 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 159 

the stone against which he stumbles in his ungraceful, 
shambling walk. 

A METAPHYSICAL CONUNDRUM. 

Perhaps the disciples thought of all this as they gazed 
upon the poor blind beggar at their feet. And yet 
their compassion was not stirred. The spectacle rather 
suggested a metaphysical conundrum, and they turned 
to Jesus with the question: "Rabbi, who did sin, this 
man or his parents, that he was born blind ? " Notice 
the assumptions of this question. 

1. It assumes at least the possibility of a previous 
state of conscious existence in which there may have 
been ethical conditions — that is, in which the person may 
have been able to sin. We learn that the idea of me- 
tempsychosis was not unknown among the Jews in the 
time of Jesus. The doctrine of the pre-existence of 
souls was maintained by the Rabbins, the Essenes, in 
the Cabbola, and in Wisdom viii., 19. 

2. It assumes that every affliction was caused by the 
sin of the sufferer himself, or by that of his ancestors; 
if in this case it could not be traced to the man's parents 
it rested with him, and must therefore have been com- 
mitted before his birth-hour in this life; and under- 
neath it all lay this presupposition as something that 
could never be even so much as questioned, as the rule 
without any exception, namely: Every pain is the pro- 
duct of sin. This is an old doctrine, as old as any liter- 
ature. When Job had led an apparently faultless and 
exemplary life, yet had had that life overwhelmed by 
stupendous misfortunes, he was visited by probably the 
three other greatest men of his age. They gave seven 



160 THE GOSPEL OP SPIKITCJAL INSIGHT. 

days to the study of this unexampled case, and the result 
of the most profound research of the ablest intellects of 
that age was no other solution of the difficulty than that 
suggested by the question of Eliphaz the Temanite: 
' ' Are the comforts of God small with thee ? Is there 
any secret thing with thee ? " The intimation is that 
although Job had lived unblamed of men, there must be 
in him some sin known to God: there was no other 
explanation. So through all th^ Greek tragedies there 
surges that thought that pain is the child of sin; it is 
the hunting, sure-scented, sure-footed Nemesis that dogs 
the steps of the sinner until the moment for the final 
and fatal blow to fall. And this belief was prevalent 
and dominant among the Jews in the time of Christ. 

PAIN IN THE UNIVERSE. 

This doctrine Jesus overthrows. It is true, and 
always has been true, and in the nature of things always 
must be true, that there is no sin without pain, pain at 
the moment or pain subsequently. But the converse is 
not true. It is a product of a logical fallacy, the fal- 
lacy of converting a universal affirmative proposition. 
Because there is no sin tvithout pain it does not 
follow that there is no pain without sin, any more 
than that because no man exists without having been 
born it follows that every thing which has been born 
is a man. 

No; Jesus teaches that much that we call pain, priva- 
tion, trouble, is part of an immense, a glorious, a benefi- 
cent plan. " What God works " is too large for compre- 
hension, but we can apprehend its goodness. In this 
case Jesus could not have meant that neither this man 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL LSTSIGHT. 161 

nor his parents had ever violated the moral law, but that 
no sin of theirs had resulted in the congenital blindness 
of this beggar. This man's was a single case of those 
miraculous healings which, taken together, form a 
species of that genus which is well described as "what 
God works." Jesus claimed to be God, and yet was a 
sufferer; all the world pronounces Him faultless, and 
yet He was "a man of sorrows and acquainted with 
griefs." The noblest crown ever worn by man or God 
was a crown of thorns. No human being has ever 
touched the height of his possible altitude until he had 
pain. Even Jesus, the Captain of our Salvation, was 
" made perfect through suffering." On the other hand, 
the highest possible capability of a human being is to 
believe, and the grandest object of belief is Jesus. So 
He says: "This is the work of God, that ye believe on- 
Him whom He hath sent." 

Thus in both ways, on the side of the Healer and on 
the side of the healed, " the works of God " would "be 
made manifest " in this hlind beggar. 

As if to justify Himself for stopping in a moment and 
place of peril to perform this cure and manifest this 
work of God, Jesus said : "It is necessary for Me to 
work the works of Him that sent Me while it is day ; 
for the night cometh when no man can work" (vs. 4). 
The latter part of the sentence is a well-known proverb, 
teaching that the clay of opportunity is passing while it 
is present. The lost opportunity is irrecoverable. The 
form of the proverb very naturally brought up, by asso- 
ciation of ideas, the nature of the beggar's trouble and 
Christ's own office as illuminator of the world. And on 
the eyes of blindness He was about to pour the light 



162 THE GOSPEL OP SPIEITUAL INSIGHT.* 

of day. "As long as I am in the world I am the light 
of the world." 

THE MIRACULOUS HEALING. 

Then Jesus spat upon the ground and made clay of 
the spittle and daubed the man's eyes. Why should He 
have done this ? He did not always show any visible 
sign and use any external means, as, for instance, in the 
case (in Matt, xx.) of the healing of the two blind men, 
where He merely touched the eyes. ISTor can the appli- 
cation He made in this case be considered in any way 
remedial. We know that among the ancients saliva 
was supposed to be good for sore eyes, and there is some 
intimation that clay also was supposed to have some me- 
dicinal virtue. Yet, so far as can be learned, these were 
supposed to be useful only in the case of external sores. 

But here was a blindness not seated in any sores in 
the flesh nor any growth upon the ball ; nor was it the 
result of any recent derangement of the organ of vision. 
It was congenital. The man was born with no more 
power of sight in his eyes than in his thumbs. What 
was to be done for him was something equivalent to the 
creation and insertion of a totally new organ. 

We must, therefore, conclude that the use of the clay 
had no reference to the man's body. But the ceremo- 
nial may have had reference to the man's inner nature : it 
may have had an ethical direction. It is not difficult to 
perceive how the man's faith may have been helped by 
this appeal to his bodily senses. For this is the great 
end of the movements of the universe, so far as man is 
concerned, namely, the development of his faith, as a 
man's greatness resides in his faith-power : the greater 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 163 

the capability of believing, the greater the man ; man- 
kind being classified, not by sex, or age, or weight, or 
intellectual ability, but by the ability to believe ; faith 
being the loftiest known function of a human being, 
that in him which is to be everlastingly cultivated. 

A TEST OF FAITH. 

Then immediately followed a test of the man's faith. 
" Go wash in the pool of Siloam," said Jesus to him. To 
every mind this will probably recall the case of Naaman 
the Syrian, who was told by the prophet to go and wash 
seven times in the Jordan. The proud captain was a 
rationalist, that is to say, one who trusted to the weaker 
rather than to the stronger, to the human reason rather 
than to God. He declined to go, and assigned what 
seems to be an unanswerable argument. The blind 
beggar had more sense and more humility. He said 
neither " Yes "nor " No." He simply did as he was 
bid ; and that is true religion. The description of the 
process is brief and well-nigh sublime : " He went his 
way, therefore, and washed and came seeing." The 
pool was known to him most probably. The fountain 
thereof issued from below the Temple. It was not far 
to go. He lost no time. He did not argue against the 
command ; he employed his reasoning power to enable 
him to follow the directions of Jesus. From the begin- 
ning he might have reasoned against the whole proceed- 
ing. He knew that the general belief was that while 
there may be nostrums which occasionally help some 
forms of ophthalmia, there is no cure for any one who 
has been lorn blind. He could have said to the prophet 
from Galilee : " What is this ? I have no common sore 



164 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

eyes. Born blind, how do you expect the clay to create 
what has never been in my eyes, the power of vision ? 
Can it penetrate to the core of my eye and put the sense 
of light there ? If I go to Siloam, all its waters can do 
is to wash the clay away, and then I shall be only as I 
was before the clay was daubed upon my face. I might 
just as well have a little water brought in here and wash 
this stuff off. " That is the way men talk now when the 
Christ gives some ethical direction. But the blind beg- 
gar had something better than sight, better than money. 
He had faith. 

OBEDIENCE. 

"He went, therefo7*e" : wherefore? Because Jesus 
had told him. " He washed " : that is, he did his 
part as he was told. He could not perform a miracle, 
but he could obey Jesus. "And he came seeing/' He 
was set on a new life, a life adapting itself to the envi- 
ronments made by sight and enjoying all the pleasures 
granted by sight. He seems to have gone to his friends, 
not to Jesus. And they noticed something different in 
him, and yet he was the same mam They had seen him 
too often not to know him. And yet there was some- 
thing different. He did not sit begging. His move- 
ments were new and his face was altered. 0, what a 
difference sight makes in the countenance ! Is it not 
sight which puts the countenance in the face ? Has 
a dead man any countenance ? The face of this blind 
man was precisely the same after as before the sight 
came ; but the sight let the spirit play on the face ; 
and in this case Christ had become the light of the 
countenance of the blind beggar. " Can this be he ? " 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL ItfSlGHT. 165 

the neighbors asked. " Yes ; I am he," said the restored 
man. 

A JUDICIAL INVESTIGATION. 

It has been said that it is greatly to be desired that 
there had been some judicial investigation of one of the 
miracles. Well, here it is. The Sanhedrim took up 
this case of the blind man and gave it a most searching 
investigation. The result is that after careful examina- 
tion a jury, deeply prejudiced against the fact of the mira- 
cle, and deeply hating Him who performed it, and deeply 
incensed against the man who was benefited by the 
miracle, were shut up by the overwhelming evidence to 
the verdict that here had been performed an act which 
was possible only to God. That will end it with all fair 
minds. The court could pursue Jesus not on the ground 
of being an imposter, but on the charge of violating a 
human ritual in the performance of a divine act of 
excellent mercy. So they took up the pursuit of Jesus 
after having excommunicated the happy beggar, who 
must have always felt that it was better to be saved out- 
side than damned inside the Church. 

Jesus, the Good Shepherd, pursued as He was by the 
ecclesiastical wolves, went hunting His poor sheep who- 
had been turned out of the fold. And He '{found him." 
He always does find the one lost sheep. He said to the 
restored man: "Dost thou believe on the Son of God? " 
He had believed to the opening of his bodily eyes; now 
must his spirit be enlightened. The man probably 
knew that that was equivalent to asking him whether 
he believed on Jesus as the Messiah. He was a frank, 
blunt, straightforward man. He did not know any one 



166 TfiE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL ItfSIGST. 

who claimed to be the Messiah, but the fact that Jesus 
had performed a gracious miracle on him prepared him 
to accept any one as Messiah on the testimony of Jesus. 
Then Jesus told the man that He himself was the Son 
of God, the Messiah. And the man believed. And the 
man worshiped. 

Notice that Jesus made the acknowledgment of His 
Messiahship only to the woman at the well of Samaria 
and to this man: to a prostitute and to a beggar. What 
divine condescensions ! 

Notice the progress of the new life: (1) It is obedience, 
implicit, unquestioning obedience to the Lord's com- 
mands; (2) increase of spiritual insight, the product of 
obedience; (3) worship of Jesus, the product of spiritual 
insight. 

How could a mere Galilean fisherman present such a 
marvelous psychological study as this? 






XII. 
STtjc beautiful ©tuft Sbiftytyti}. 









John X. 

(1) " Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the 
door into the fold of the sheep, but climbeth up some other way, the 
same is a thief and a robber. (2) But he that entereth in by the 
door is a shepherd of the sheep. (3) To him the porter openeth ; 
arid the sheep hear his voice : and he calleth his own sheep by name, 
and leadeth them out. (4) Wlien he hath put forth all his own, he 
goeth before them, and the sheep follow him : for they know his 
voice. (5) And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from 
him : for they know not the voice of str angers.'" (6) This parable 
spake Jesus unto them : but they understood not what things they 
were which He spake unto them. (7) Jesus therefore said unto 
(hem again, " Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the 
sheep. (8) All that came before lie are thieves and robbers : but the 
sheep did not hear them. (9) / am the door : by Me if any man 
1 miter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and go out, and shall 
find pasture. (10) The thief cometh not, but that he may steal, arid 
kill, and destroy : I came that they may have life, and may have 
it abundantly. (11) lam the good shepherd: the good shepherd 
layeth down his life for the sheep. (12) He that is a hireling, and 
not a shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, beholdeth the wolf 
coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth, and the ivolf snatcheth 
them, and scattereth them : (13) he fleeth because he is a hireling, 
and careth not for the sheep. (14) lam the good shepherd; and 
I know Mine own, and Mine own know Me, (15) even as the Fa- 
ther knoweth Me, and I know the Father; and Hay down My life 
for the sheep. (16) And other sheep I have, which are not of this 
fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear My voice ; and 
they shall become one flock, one shepherd.'''' 



THE BEAUTIFUL GOOD SHEPHERD. 
MIXED METAPHORS. 

WHEN Jesus met the blind man to whom He had 
given sight and had His conversation with him 
there appear to have been present some of the Pharisees, 
who seem to have dogged His steps. Upon the blind 
man's acceptance of Jesus as the Messiah, He fell into a 
soliloquy, saying to Himself: " For judgment have I come 
into this world, that they which see not might see, and 
that they which see might be made blind." Then the 
self-conceited Pharisees asked: " Are we blind also?" 
And Jesus replied: " If ye were blind ye should have no 
sin; but now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remain- 
eth." It was in continuation of that statement that 
Jesus uttered His discourse on the Fold, the Shepherd, 
and the Sheep. 

This discourse violates the stiffness of our modern 
rhetoric. There is a free mixture of metaphors, in 
which the same person is represented now as a door, and 
then as a sheep, and then as a shepherd. Nevertheless 
it is probable that no reader, learned or unlearned, has 
ever been confused by the shifting of figures. The 
speech is an allegory rather than a parable: it sets one 
thing to represent another instead of telling a story with 
a moral. It takes the facts of shepherd life to represent 
the facts in the kingdom of God. The chief lesson is 
the relation of Jesus to all the flocks of God, as the True 
Chief Shepherd, and the relation of all false teachers to 
Him, as enemies to Him, and so enemies to God's flocks 



170 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL IKSlGHT. 

in every place and time. In setting that forth other 
lessons are suggested. 

THE SHEEPFOLD. 

In the. first place of all there is the sheepfold. A fold 
separates a certain space from all space. In the case 
of the sheepfold it does separate the sheep that are 
entered from all other things. There certainly is not 
only a difference among God's own sheep, but there is 
also a distinction between God's sheep and all other 
animals, whether brute or human. The fence or wall 
that divides God's sheep from the world is invisible. It 
is religious and ethical. But there is difference between 
inclosures, whether moral or physical. Among the latter 
a fort incloses as well as a prison, but the latter keeps in 
and the former keeps out. A sheepfold is of the former 
character. It is not constructed to confine the sheep. 
They would naturally keep together so much at night 
that if there were no danger from thieves and wild beasts 
it would scarcely be worth while to build folds. The 
fold is especially protective. 

It is important to notice that. Much harm has come 
to souls from misapprehension of this distinction. Take 
the moral law, for instance. How like a prison it seems 
to many men ! One feels, if he does not say, Oh, if it 
were not wrong to steal, how I could increase my estate ! 
Another, Oh, if it were not wrong to commit adultery, 
how my pleasures in life could be increased ! They feel 
like a foolish sheep in a fold might be fancied to feel, 
namely, that the fold was made to keep him in, provok- 
ingly curtailing his privileges, not seeing that it is the 
fold which permits him to rest in security by excluding 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL ItfSIGHT. 171 

whatsoever would harm him. To one of God's sheep 
the existence of God's fold seems due to the fact of his 
spiritual danger. So everywhere the divine sanction to 
the moral distinction between right and wrong is dis- 
tinctively protective. All the sheep inside that fold are 
on the right side and are safe, while all outside are in 
great peril. 

CHARACTERISTICS OF A GOOD SHEPHERD. 

Now, that is real because it is ideal. The ideal is a 
reality as certainly as is the practical. But the ten- 
dency of the ideal is to become concrete. Those who are 
God's spiritual sheep find out one another and collect 
together because they are gregarious. Hence commu- 
nities, societies, churches, whatever you call them. 
And these flocks have shepherds' care. The figure is 
mixed, but the thought is clear. Jesus gives the char- 
acteristics of a true shepherd. It is to be observed 
that, in verse 2, the translation should be "a shepherd 
of the sheep." There are two allegories in this speech. 
The first regards the shepherds of the visible folds, and 
the second the Shepherds of the whole flock of God. In 
regard to the former: 

1. Each has entered God's fold by the door, and there 
are not two doors to a fold; and Jesus says that He is 
the door of the sheep. That is to say that no man can 
be a good pastor of any church who has not entered 
God's fold through Christ. Whatever may be his nat- 
ural gifts, whatever his acquired learning and refine- 
ment, whatever his ecclesiastical training and ordina- 
tion, the essential thing to a proper pastorate is that the 
pastor shall have come to God through Christ. If he 



172 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 

assume the pastorate by reason of educational equipment 
and ecclesiastical ordination, Christ pronounces him "& 
thief and a robber." An atheist or a deist may be 
ordained by the imposition of hands, but he can not de- 
ceive any one whose approach to God has been only 
through Christ. 

2. The next characteristic of the true pastor is that 
the porter openeth to him. It is not safe or profitable 
to strain every part of a parable or an allegory. It may 
not be best to designate this " porter," this doorkeeper, 
precisely and positively. Because so many devout and 
thoughtful men have interpreted this name to indicate 
the Holy Spirit we can not cast contempt on that sug- 
gestion, especially when we read in Acts xiv., 27 that 
Paul and Barnabas tell how God had " opened " the 
"door" of faith unto the Gentiles, and Paul reports 
how "a great door and effectual had been opened" to 
him in Ephesus (1 Cor. xvi., 9); and a "door" had 
been "opened" in Troas (2 Cor. ii., 12); and solicits 
the saints in Colosse to pray that God would "open " a 
"door" for him (Col. iv., 3). Whoever the porter be, 
the second characteristic of a good pastor is that he cer- 
tainly has access to the hearts of God's people. 

3. They listen to His voice. It is the voice that tells 
the personality. It is the voice that made the com- 
munication : not merely the dry thought, but the spirit 
of the speaker. There is an electric change superin- 
duced by the voice in producing undulations of air. 
And each voice has a characteristic electric effect. 
There is a difference between reading a discourse and 
hearing that discourse, a difference which perhaps lies 
at the foundation of God's ordinance that His truth 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 173 

should take the world by " the foolishness of preaching." 
Each pastor has his own voice. ' There are no sheep to 
whom some voice is not adapted, and the man who has 
that voice is that sheep's pastor. Hence the great dif- 
ference in pastors, because there is such a great differ- 
ence in sheep. " His own sheep " " hear his voice." 

4. There are many beautiful stories told of shepherd- 
life, of the beautiful intimacy between the sheep and the 
shepherd. In the East there may be the several flocks 
of several shepherds kept in the same fold through the 
night, but in the morning each shepherd calls his sheep, 
and he calls them by name. Sometimes the name is 
given on account of some peculiarity which is a defect, 
an infirmity, or a deformity. Sometimes it is " One- 
eye," sometimes "Torn-ear," sometimes "Broken-leg"; 
but each sheep knows his name. And the shepherd's 
intimacy grows with each morning's call, and he seems 
to love those sheep which are marked by some peculiar- 
ity, and sometimes he loves it on account of that pecu- 
liarity. The " voice " is not merely that which gives 
forth sound, but that which also carries the pulsations 
of the shepherd's heart in the articulate utterance of 
his vocal organs. 

The story is told of a traveler in Greece who found 
three flocks in one fold, all mingled together. Although 
there were two thousand of them, each shepherd called 
"his own," and his sheep came out, "all" his sheep, 
and not one that belonged to either of the other two 
shepherds. The traveler thought that the sheep knew 
each his shepherd by his dress, and said so. Then he 
changed dresses with one of the shepherds, and began 
to call the sheep. They lifted their heads a moment at 



174 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

hearing their names called, and looked at the caller, but 
although he had on their shepherd's dress, the sheep 
turned away and paid no further attention until the 
shepherd himself called, and then the sheep came at his 
bidding. 

5. He leadeth His sheep : every good pastor does 
this. He has explored the road, looking for pasture, 
and he has come back, not for his own sake, but for the 
sake of the sheep, in order that he may bring them to 
the nourishment which is needed and desired by them. 
"Hegoeth before": he does not drive. He still uses 
the attraction of his voice. He keeps in front. If 
there be any danger he will be the first to see it and the 
first to meet it, and will be on hand to ward it off. He 
may have to lift a lame sheep over a rough place, or 
carry some lamb in his bosom when the flock is crossing 
a stream. 

HOW FLOCKS ARE FORMED. 

It is thus that flocks are formed. True, flocks do not 
choose their shepherds, but shepherds choose their 
flocks. But there is something in each shepherd which 
specially suits each sheep, or else he soon gets rid of 
that sheep. Just as it is in our modern Christian life, 
in what we call "churches." We do see congregations, 
flocks of Christians choosing their pastor. When such 
a thing occurs, the new man comes, but he is not felt as 
a pastor until his "voice" has been heard. After he 
has taught in private and in public for a while some of 
the sheep drop off and go to other folds. And they do 
right. There is but one reason for being a member of 
any congregation, and that is the fact that the preaching 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 175 

there feeds, comforts, helps, guides, and strengthens 
the parishioner. Locality, congenial society, denomina- 
tion, worldly advantages, should have little to do with 
it. " Who is the man that most helps me in my Chris- 
tian life ? " is the one question. I can move my residence, 
I can form new associations, but I must be under the 
pastoral care not only of a soul-feeder, but of one who 
can feed my soul. It is no disparagement to the pastor 
I leave. He may be the very man to lead and feed a 
thousand other souls whom the man who is to be my 
pastor could not reach. Let six men of God who have 
themselves spiritually entered the fold through the only 
door, through Jesus Christ, go into a town of five thousand 
inhabitants and continue to preach the Gospel in private 
and in public, according to their several ability : and let 
all the people from time to time hear all these men : in 
process of time they will gather around these men, each 
going to his own shepherd, the shepherd whose voice 
reaches, arouses, calls them. And when each pastor has 
called out his own, there may still be a thousand people 
who not yet have heard their pastor's voice ; but when 
the next preacher lifts up his voice, behold, his sheep 
know it. 

A Sunday-school teacher is one of the under-shep- 
herds, and all that is said of shepherds must apply to 
them. 

The Pharisees who were around Jesus were the men 
who claimed to be the pastors of God's sheep in their 
day. So dull, so blind, so self-conceited were they that 
they understood nothing of this striking allegory. Then 
Jesus, by using that introduction to most solemn speech 
which must have become familiar to the Pharisees, 



176 THE GOSPEL OE SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

" Verily, verily, I say unto you/' proceeded to say : " I 
am the door of sheep. All that ever came before Me 
are thieves and robbers." Well, who had come before 
Jesus ? The devil, the wolf of hell, the false shepherd, 
who had come to steal, to kill, and to devour, who was 
" the first thief that clomb into the fold of God," whose 
followers were the Pharisees then present, wherefore 
Jesus employed the present tense and said, " are thieves 
and robbers." 

A SECOND ALLEGORY. 

The first allegory is followed by another, in which He 
makes the shepherd representative of Himself. "I am 
the Beautiful Shepherd" says He. And He does not 
employ a word which conveys the mere idea of comeli- 
ness, or is simply indicative of that which addresses the 
assthetic sense in man, but a word that contains the 
double idea of attractiveness and goodness, expressing 
that beauty which can not exist without goodness, that 
which is attractive not because of superficial contour and 
color, but that the symmetry of which satisfies the intel- 
lect, while its inner self kindles the affections. In English 
we must call Him " the Beautiful Good Shepherd," if we 
would embrace the ideas in the epithet which He applies 
to Himself. 

This Shepherd gives all His sheep life, liberty, and 
succor. Life is. something more than mere existence. 
An oyster has life in the sense of mere vitality. But 
life means all the best and most desirable things which 
a human being can gather to his spirit out of all the 
things within his reach. The Good Shepherd came that 
His sheep " might have life and have it more abun- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 177 

dantly." He heaps life up for all His sheep. He 
knows the places where they can get the best, and He 
carries them hither by a wonderfully wise and tender 
providence. Sometimes the pasture lies far away, and 
it is therefore a long journey. His sheep often wonder 
why He does not let them stay where they are, but they 
would die there if He did not carry them forward. 
Sometimes His treatment seems very harsh, but He is 
bringing them where they should be, and where they 
would be if they only knew what was best for them and 
where that was. A shepherd once was striving to get 
his flock up from a valley where all the pasture had been 
consumed to a table-land where he knew the grazing 
was abundant. But the ascent was rough, and the flock 
reluctant. They knew their shepherd, but they would 
not climb. And then he took a lamb and laid it on the 
ledge. It missed its mother, and crept to the edge and 
bleated; the mother sheep had missed her baby lamb, 
and wondered that the shepherd had been so cruel as to 
take her only one; but she could not stay from her lamb: 
she soon found her way to the summit, and the whole 
gregarious flock soon followed. So sometimes a dead 
child in a congregation has been more powerful than the 
living pastor, because the Great, Beautiful, Good Shep- 
herd knew us all so well. 

And the Beautiful Good Shepherd lays down His life 
for the sheep. So does every good pastor. In actual 
life, in Scotland, in the East, the shepherd perils his 
life for the flock. He is exposed to all changes of 
weather. He encounters wild beasts in the fury of 
their hunger. David tells how he slew a lion and a bear 
in defense of his flock. Every father of a family worthy 



178 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL IKSIGHT. 

Ins privilege dedicates his life to that family, and will 
work himself to death, if need be, for their support. 
Every mother lays her life down on the altar of mother- 
hood. Every pastor of a church lays down his life, with 
all that is in it, for the flock whereof God has made him 
shepherd. And He, Chief Shepherd, Best Shepherd, 
Most Beautiful Shepherd, hath bound us to Him for- 
ever by the new, deep, thrilling tones which came into 
His voice, amid the agonies of Golgotha, when He gave 
His life for all His sheep. Wherever, in all places and 
times, there are those who hear that voice and follow it, 
Jesus, Beautiful Shepherd, must bring them together, 
that His heart's desire may be fulfilled, and there shall 
be one fold and one Shepherd. 



XIII. 
SEfje Itifc ani tfje Resurrection. 



John XI. 

(21) Martha therefore said unto Jesus, " Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my 
brother had not died. (22) And even now I know that, whatsoever Thou shalt ask 
of God, God will give Thee." (23) Jesus saith unto her, " Thy brother shall rise 
again." (24) Martha saith unto Him, " / know that he shall rise again in the 
resurrection at the last day." (25) Jesus saith unto her, "lam the resurrection 
and the life : he that believeth on Me, though he die, yet shall he live ; (26) and 
whosoever liveth and believeth on Me shall never die. Believest thou this f " (27) 
She saith unto him, " Yea, Lord : I have believed that Thou art the Christ, the 
Son of God, even He that cometh into the world." (28) And when she had said 
this, she went away, and called Mary her sister secretly, saying, " The Master is 
here, and calleth thee." (29) And she, when she heard it, arose quickly, and 
went unto Him. (30) Now Jesus was not yet come into the village, but was still 
in the place where Martha met Him. (31) The Jews then which were with her in 
the house, and were comforting her, when they saw Mary, that she rose up quickly 
and went out, followed her, supposing that she was going into the tomb to weep 
there. (32) Mary therefore, when she came where Jesus was, and saw Him, fell 
down at His feet, saying unto Him, " Lord, if Thou hadst been here, my brother 
had not died." (33) When Jesus therefore saw her weeping, and the Jews also 
weeping which came with her, He groaned in the spirit, and was troubled, (34) 
and said, " Where have ye laid him ? " They say unto Him, " Lord, come and 
see." (35) Jesus wept. (36) The Jews therefore said, " Behold how He loved 
him ! " (37) But some of them said, " Could not this man, which opened the eyes 
of him that was blind, have caused that this man also should not die?" (38) 
Jesus therefore again groaning in Himself cometh to the tomb. Now it was a 
cave, and a stone lay against it. (39) Jesus saith, " Take ye away the stone.'' 
Martha, the sister of him that was dead, saith unto Him, " Lord, by this lime he 
stinketh : for he hath been dead four days." (40) Jesus saith unto her, " Said I 
not unto thee that if thou believedst, thou shouldst see the glory of God ? " (41) 
So they took away the stone. And Jesus lifted up His eyes, and said, " Father, I 
thank Thee that Thou heardest Me. (42) And I knew that Thou hearesl Me 
always : but because of the multitude which standeth around I said it, that they 
may believe that Thou didst send Me." (43) And when He had thus spoken, He 
cried with a loud voice, " Lazarus, come forth." (44) He that was dead came 
forth, bound hand and foot with grave clothes ; and his face was bound about 
with a napkin. Jesus saith unto them, " Loose him, and let him go" 



THE LIFE AND THE RESURRECTION.* 
BETHANY. 

JESUS must have felt at the Feast of the Tabernacles 
that the end of His career was approaching. He 
retired from the capital, and passed across the Jordan 
into Perea, the territory of Herod Antipas. 

The Bethany in Perea was about thirty miles from 
the Olivet Bethany, which is less than two miles from 
Jerusalem. While Jesus was carrying forward His 
work on the east of the Jordan, Lazarus sickened. 
Lazarus was the cherished friend of Jesus. Indeed, 
nowhere else in His history do we find Jesus enjoying 
the amenities of society in repose, and away from the 
glare of publicity which notable men of affairs must 
always endure, except in this Bethany household, which 
consisted of a busy, bustling elder sister, a gentle, 
thoughtful younger sister, and a quiet brother, probably 
the youngest of the three. Bethany was so near to Je- 
rusalem that it presented Jesus a place of easy retreat, 
and it was so small and unimportant a village, lying nestled 
quietly on the mountain-side, containing no residence 
of official personage, whether civil or ecclesiastical, that 
it afforded a safe and happy escape from the bickerings 
and contentions of the excitable metropolis. Jesus had 
put Himself upon the footing of most respectful famil- 

* This chapter is largely adapted from the author's " The Light of the 
Nations." 



182 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

iarity with this family, insomuch that Martha came to 
Him with her petty household cares, and the gentle 
Mary became His companion. These people were not 
desperately poor, but rather in moderately comfortable 
circumstances, seeing that they entertained company 
and were owners of a family burial-place. 

When Lazarus sickened, the sisters dispatched a mes- 
senger to Jesus, saying simply: "Lord, behold he whom 
You love is sick." It was a request delicately imbedded 
in an expression of trustfulness, but there was no teas- 
ing urgency. When Jesus heard it, He said: "This 
sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, 
that the Son of God may be glorified thereby." This 
was a declaration which showed that Jesus believed He 
could see the conclusion of this whole matter, and the 
results proved how correct it was. It was not merely 
an opinion of a case of sickness, expressed after hearing 
the symptoms from the messenger, but it was of the 
nature of a prediction. It gave the messenger comfort 
to carry to the sisters, which probably he immediately 
did. 

REMAINING IN PEREA. 

After receiving the message Jesus remained in Perea 
two days before He again alluded to the subject or made 
any change in His movements. He then said to His 
disciples: " Let us go into Judea." They recalled the 
painful scenes through which they had so lately passed 
with Him in Jerusalem, scenes which impressed them 
deeply with the feeling that the intentions of the ruling 
party were most malignant. They replied: "Kabbi, 
the Jews of late sought to stone You, and do You go 
there again ? " His answer was: " Are there not twelve 



THE GOSPEL OF .SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 183 

hours in the day ? If any one walk in the day, he does 
not stumble, because he sees the light of this world. 
But if any one walk in the night, he stumbles, because 
there is no light in him." 

There is in these words not only a lofty truth as to 
the special mission of our Lord, but an important 
principle touching all human life. The disciples desired 
to prolong His life by keeping Him from His enemies. 
He did not desire to lose His life in any sense, either by 
having His career cut short by His foes, or by His own 
departure from the line of His rightful work. He held 
that if He should protract the years of His natural life 
by keeping out of the line of His work, because the peril 
of death lay therein, His life would be lost in a worse 
manner than if He were killed in doing His work at the 
right time and place. He should have outlived Him- 
felf, and thus have lost His life. Safety and happiness 
lie only in doing the assigned work, discharging the 
obvious duty. That is walking in the light. There is 
just so much of light and life, say " twelve hours." If a 
man fill those hours with the right work, he has gained 
life. If he omit, and then endeavor to go out in the night 
to work, he stumbles. To apply it to Himself: if His duty 
call Him to Bethany, thither He must go, even if the 
Jews kill Him; for staying away is stepping out of the 
light of duty into the night of selfishness. If Jesus do 
so, He can no longer accomplish any good in Perea, or 
Galilee, or elsewhere. He must walk in the day. 

LAZARUS IS " SLEEPING." 

He then said to them: " Lazarus, our friend, is sleep- 
ing; but I go that I may awake him." He knew that 



184 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

Lazarus was lying dead, in the Bethany near Jerusalem. 
He desired to prepare the minds of His disciples for the 
dangerous journey, and so began to let them know the 
exact state of the case. They took His statement liter- 
ally, and said: " Lord, if he sleep, he shall recover." But 
Jesus spoke of his death. In all languages sleep is rep- 
resented as the image of death; but it comes with extra- 
ordinary beauty and force from the lips of Him who is 
going to arouse the sleeper. Then Jesus said to them 
plainly: " Lazarus is dead, and I am glad on your 
account that I was not there, that ye may believe; but 
let us go to him." 

The history here inserts a little incident which is very 
beautiful, and which sheds light on a certain cast of 
character. Thomas, called Didymus, turned to his 
fellow-disciples and said very pathetically, ■" Let us also 
go, that we may die with Him." Thomas was an honest 
skeptic, a constitutional doubter, a desponding soul. 
He required the most grossly palpable proofs to win his 
belief. But he was true-hearted and brave when he did 
believe. And of just such stuff do we find a certain 
class of doubters and melancholy men in all ages. 
Lazarus was dead. Jesus was going to die. The circle 
was breaking. " Let us all go together," said this sad, 
brave man. His faith could not reach to the heights of 
his Master's predictions, but his fidelity made him ready 
to follow that Master unto the death. 

Why Jesus should have delayed two days in Perea 
after receiving the message of Martha and Mary we can 
only conjecture, and scarcely any theory yet presented 
seems entirely satisfactory. He did not idle. He was 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 185 

not endeavoring to while away time. In Perea He found 
plenty of work to do, and He chose to finish what had 
been so auspiciously begun. It is true that He might 
have left some disciples behind Him and have returned. 
But He did not intend to return. His career was com- 
ing to its close. Moreover, He was never hurried. He 
had that self-possession which, when conjoined with 
high intellectual and moral qualities, is the measure of 
true greatness. He knew what He could do, and what 
He would do. And then He had respect to those, His 
dearest friends, whose spiritual improvement was a rul- 
ing consideration in this matter. He was working for 
the good of men and for the glory of God. He neither 
loitered nor hurried. 

JESUS RETURNS TO BETHANY. 

When Jesus reached Bethany, He found that Lazarus 
had been already "four days in the tomb." It would 
seem that when the messenger was dispatched by the 
sisters, Lazarus was still living. Such their message 
implied. It was therefore satisfactory and consolatory 
to the messenger to hear Jesus say that that sickness 
was not unto death. He must have been greatly sur- 
prised when he returned and found Lazarus buried; 
and if he delivered the message to the sisters, they 
must have been sorely puzzled, for Lazarus had died in 
the meantime. This message must have seemed to them 
to show that Jesus had lost His way. He had said that 
this sickness was not unto death at the very moment 
when Lazarus was in his grave, for the Jews made haste 
to bury their dead out of their sight, and a prompt inter- 



186 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL ItfSIGHT. 

ment was intended to be an honor to the deceased. 
When this message came to Martha and Mary, it must 
have been a double blow. They had had such love for 
Lazarus, and such confidence in the power of Jesus ; and 
now Lazarus was dead and Jesus was mistaken, or, if 
not mistaken, He did not regard them enough to come 
and explain His dark sayings. So it seemed to them. 
Lazarus must have died the day the messenger left for 
Perea, and been buried before sundown. That journey 
occupied a day. Jesus spent two other days in Perea, 
and the fourth was given to the journey to Bethany ; so 
that when He arrived, it was the fourth day that the 
corpse of Lazarus had been in the grave. 

The sorrow of this stricken family had called to them 
their neighboring friends, and also many Jews from 
Jerusalem, some undoubtedly sincerely sympathizing 
with these afflicted young women, others simply going 
through the ceremonies of condolence in a perfunctory 
manner, and others perhaps desirous of bringing back 
into the fold of orthodoxy these excellent women, who 
had been turned aside by the fascination and friendship 
of the young heresiarch of Nazareth. There was a 
crowd in the house. Martha, always busy and bustling, 
was in a position to hear of the approach of Jesus, and 
she hastened to meet Him. Mary was sitting quiet in 
the house. The traits of character in each came out 
under the new and exciting circumstance of the arrival 
of Jesus. Martha met Him first, and the words that 
burst from her lips indicate what had been the thoughts, 
and probably the sayings, of the sisters in His absence: 
" Lord, if You had been here, my brother had not 
died ! " 




THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 187 



MARTHA'S SPEECH. 

This speech is a study. Martha had had ample 
opportunity to ' investigate the character of Jesus. She 
had seen Him both fatigued and rested; had noticed 
Him gazing in revery far into the air, or down the 
mountain-slope, as He sat before the door of her house; 
had heard Him when He was engaged in conversation 
with Lazarus or some of the disciples; had watched His 
intercourse with Mary; noticed, as only woman 's quick 
eye can notice, all His movements about the house, His 
dress and address, His dispositions of Himself, His off- 
guard moods, His temper under provocation, and all 
those things which have been said to make a man cease 
to be a hero to his valet. The whole impression made 
upon her mind was that He was so holy as to have most 
intimate communion with God, such intimacy as gave 
Him most extraordinary power, such power as would 
have enabled Him even to push back death and keep her 
brother alive. But she did not know, it would seem, of 
the miracles He had wrought in far-off Galilee in restor- 
ing other persons to life, and did not imagine such a 
possibility as the resurrection of her brother. To 
Martha Jesus was a divine personage, but not Deity. 
To the saying, " If You had been here my brother had 
not died," she added, probably after a pause and a sob, 
" Even now I know that whatever You will ask of God, 
God will give to You."' What she expected Him to ask 
of God is not apparent. She was in the tumult of a 
fresh and great bereavement, swayed by hopes and fears 
and griefs. 

The spiritual elevation of every person who came 



188 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

within the circle of His influence was manifestly the 
design of all that Jesus did and said. To give back her 
brother simply was merely to indulge Martha's natural 
desires for a season, leaving her still in great distress 
because her brother might be snatched from her again 
at any moment. Her suffering, in that case, would have 
been such as Wordsworth, in his fine poem of Laodamia, 
has described to have been that of his heroine when the 
shade of Protesilaus was restored to her for a brief time 
and then withdrawn. It was needful that Martha 
should so recover her brother that it would be impossible 
ever to lose him again, and thus become rooted with him 
in the element of the imperishable. Jesus proceeded not 
simply to restore her brother, but to furnish her with a 
remedy against all forms in which death could possibly 
assault humanity, bodily or spiritually. 

Jesus said to her: "Your brother shall rise again V 
Martha replied: "I know that he shall rise again at 
the resurrection at the last day." It is to be noticed that 
she speaks of the resurrection as a doctrine currently 
received, and as including the restoration to life of all 
dead men, simply in virtue of their being men and being 
dead; and also that this was to be accomplished for all 
the race at the last day. As if she had said: "Of course, 
as he has shared the fate of all men in dying, he shall 
share the fate of all men in rising." 

A PRODIGIOUS CLAIM.. 

But Jesus taught her another doctrine and advanced 
a most prodigious claim for Himself. He said: "I am 
the Resurrection and the Life. He who believes on Me, 






THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 189 

even if he were dead, shall live; and every one who lives 
and believes in Me shall not ultimately die." He 
removes from the plane of natural causes both life and 
the resurrection, and declares that the power of both 
resides in Him; that He is the dynamical force of all 
forms of life; that without Him no one who is dead 
could possibly be restored; and that those who are alive 
and have connection with Him can not finally perish. 
He represents Himself as the fountain of soul-life and 
of the animal life that is in man. He is the life. He is 
Lifeness itself. If He bring Himself to bear upon the 
dead, they live. If He bring Himself to bear upon the 
living, so long, through the ages, as this remains, they 
are not able to die. He is the Eesurrection for Lazarus, 
and He is the Life for Martha. 

Upon this He appealed to her: " Do you believe this ? " 
Martha did not unequivocally express her faith in this 
startling and immense claim, but she did reply, i( I have 
reached the belief that You are the Christ — the Anointed 
One — the Son of God that was to come into the world. " 
It was a noble thing in her not to give hasty assent to 
what she could neither understand nor believe. Jesus 
had uttered something too deep for her, and then star- 
tled her by the sudden question, " Do you believe all 
this ? " She could not say whether she did or not, be- 
cause she was not sure that she quite apprehended the 
meaning ; but she did believe that He was the Mes- 
siah, and was quite ready to say that much. If that 
meant what Jesus meant, then " Yes, Lord " ; if not, 
then "Nay, Lord; not yet that much; but I have 
believed and do believe that You are the Messiah." 



190 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 



MARY AND JESUS. 

Having said this, she went her way and privately 
sought Mary, not choosing to let the Jews from Jerusa- 
lem know that Jesus was so near, for she must have 
known the intensity of the malignant hatred of the 
Jews towards Jesus. She said to Mary : " The Master 
is here, and calls for you." When Mary heard this, she 
arose quickly and came to Him. Jesus had not come to 
the house, nor indeed into the village, but was near, 
perhaps between the house and the burial-place. When 
the Jews who were in the house, and had been endeavor- 
ing to comfort her, saw Mary rise up hastily and go out, 
they followed her, thinking that she was going to the 
tomb to weep there. When Mary reached Jesus, she fell at 
His feet — an act of homage which Martha had not paid, 
an expression of adoring love, perhaps brought suddenly 
from her by the recollection that she had been sitting in 
the house while her dear friend was so near. She ex- 
claimed, "Lord, if You had been here, my brother had 
not died." In the identity of this speech with that of 
Martha, both coming out in the great emotion of the 
first meeting, we see what had been the tenor of their 
conversation in the absence of the dear friend. It was 
the unfortunate absence which occasioned all their 
trouble. The confidence in Jesus of these two women, 
who were so different in temperament, is really affect- 
ingly beautiful. 

The outburst of Mary stirred the hearts of the Jews 
who had come to mourn with her, and they wept. When 
Jesus saw this deep emotion, he was vehemently agitated. 
The language of the original history (John xi., 33) 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 191 

intimates a complex mental condition, a combination of 
grief and anger, " He grew wroth in His spirit and dis- 
turbed Himself ! " His sympathies were intense. He 
loved Mary. He could not endure to see her suffer so 
keenly. These were reasons for tears ; but why should 
He be angry ? That is not so easy to answer. Neither 
Mary nor the Jews had done any thing on this occasion 
to arouse His indignation. It is absurd to suppose that 
the mere death of Lazarus had produced this state of 
feeling, or that He had any regrets for His own absence 
when Lazarus died ; because He knew that He was about 
to raise him from the dead, and He had said to His dis- 
ciples that He was glad He was not present at the death, 
because He knew that it was for the glory of God. We 
can not very clearly discern good reason for His anger, 
but He ivas angry. It may be that an intense percep- 
tion of all the wrong that sin was working in the race 
came upon Him, and the discords and jangles of the 
world broke on His sensitive soul with a force that 
excited Him violently. If this be not the explanation, 
we do not know what is ; but it is quite clear that the 
historian describes Him as angered. 

A LOFTY GRIEF. 

He said, " Where have you laid him ?" They replied, 
" Lord, come and see." 

Jesus wept. 

On the way to the sepulcher the company noticed that 
manly tears were silently flowing down the cheeks of 
Jesus, like a shower of soft rain after a thunder-clap. 
Something had angered Him. Now he was weeping. 
Some of the Jews said to others, ' ' See how He loved 



192 THE GOSPEL OP SPIEITUAL IKSIGHT. 

him." And then, recollecting the case of the blind man 
in Jerusalem, whom Jesus had restored to sight, they 
said, " Could not this man, who opened the eyes of the 
blind, have caused even that this man should not have 
died ? " It must be noticed that this remark shows 
that the restoration of the blind man had been settled as 
a fact in the popular opinion of Jerusalem. The spec- 
tators saw in Jesus unmistakable signs of affection for 
Lazarus. He had shown great power in the case of the 
blind man ; did His ability to save stop at that limit ? 
In that case He had been criticised for doing too much ; 
here, for doing too little. The anger of Jesus rose 
again, and exploded in a groan rather than in a verbal 
reply to their foolish gainsaying. 

They came to the tomb. It was a cave. A stone lay 
against it. Jesus said to them, " Take the stone away." 
Martha shrank from the exposure, and expostulated : 
" Lord, already he " — she said with instinctive shudder- 
ing and painful reluctance — " stinketh ; for he has 
been buried four days." Here was a conflict between 
her faith in the friendly power of Jesus and her despond- 
ing disposition. She did not know that putrefaction 
had begun ; the word ' ' for " shows that she had merely 
inferred it from the length of time her brother had been in 
the tomb. Jesus reassured her. " Did I not say to you that 
if you would believe, you should see the glory of God ? " 

Then they removed the stone. Jesus lifted up His 
eyes and said, "Father, I thank Thee that Thou hast 
heard Me. And I know that Thou hearest Me always ; 
but because of the multitude which stand around I said 
this, that they may believe that Thou hast sent Me." 
This remarkable speech seems to be the utterance of a 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 193 

sentiment of internal spiritual communion, and not a 
prayer in the form of petition, although Jesus did make 
such prayers. This was no "show-prayer." It was a 
Eucharist, a thanksgiving, such as was in His heart, 
and He chose to utter it that the people hearing it might 
believe that He was the Sent of God, the Christ, the Mes- 
siah, or at least perceived that He believed Himself to be 
such. The raising of the dead was the experimenhim 
cruris, the final and indisputable test and proof of Mes- 
siahship. He accepted it as such. ■ He had raised the dead 
at least twice before, in the cases of the daughter of the 
nobleman and the son of the Nain widow, but never under 
circumstances like these, in which the deceased was an 
adult, had been dead and buried now the fourth day, 
and spectators from Jerusalem, the seat of ecclesiastical 
authority and of enmity to Jesus, were present in a 
crowd sufficient to examine all the phenomena of the 
miracle, and to detect collusions and tricks. They 
were certain that Lazarus was dead. It could not have 
been an arrangement on the part of these young women 
and Jesus. His whole character was such that not only 
would He not have entered into any such arrangement, 
but if they had desired to glorify the great Teacher by 
getting up a pseudo-miracle, He would never for the 
sake of friendship have yielded Himself unwillingly to 
be part of such a scheme. Moreover, the grief of Martha 
and Mary, as well as that of Jesus, was not feigned. If 
it had been, the Jews, who had three days for observa- 
tion, would have detected it. They were so thoroughly 
convinced of the death of Lazarus that they themselves 
wept with Mary and admired the tenderness of the 
friendship of Jesus. 



194 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

THE CRISIS OF JESUS, 

It was the crisis of Jesus. He stood before the 
opened tomb, and, with a loud voice, cried, " Lazarus, 
come forth." Then he who had been dead came forth, 
in just such plight as corpses were customarily laid away 
in the grave, namely, with narrow strips of linen 
wrapped about each limb, so that while motion was ob- 
structed it was not impracticable. So thorough was the 
restoration that he needed no aid to obey the command 
of Jesus, but walked forth into the presence of the assem- 
bly. Jesus simply said, " Loose him, and let him go." 
That is, take away whatever encumbers him and let him 
go home. 

One can not fail to notice the absence of all parade 
and mumbling and incantation, as if this were the work 
of a magician. The history is beautiful on the side of 
the human passions, and sublime on the side of the 
simple exercise of power in doing what only God has 
always been supposed to be capable of performing. There 
is no indulgence of curiosity, no telling of tales brought 
back from the prison-house of the sepulcher, no marvels, 
no self-gratulation upon the part of Jesus, no sense of ex- 
haustion, as if He had poured vital force from Himself 
into His dead friend. The veil is dropped over any 
conversation Jesus might have had with His dear friend, 
and the most delicate silence preserved as to the display 
of feeling upon the part of Lazarus and his sisters at 
his restoration, and any loving thanks they may have 
heaped upon their benefactor. Even tradition does not 
venture upon repeating to us any thing Lazarus may 
have been represented as saying of his sensations in 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 195 

dying, his experience of being dead, and his emotion 
upon the return of the spirit to its seat in the body, and 
the reattachment of the cords of life which had been 
snapped. Tradition only tells us that Lazarus asked 
Jesus if he should die again, and when informed that 
there still lay before him the inevitable fate of human- 
ity, he never smiled again. But there is no foundation 
for that. It is the unnatural fancy of some gloomy 
mind. 

There is an old tradition in Epiphanius which tells us 
that Lazarus was thirty years old when the miracle 
was performed, and lived thirty years afterwards. Other 
legends recount that his bones were discovered in Cyprus, 
a.d. 890, and still another that, accompanied by Mary 
and Martha, Lazarus traveled to Provence in France 
and preached the Gospel in Marseilles. But a sort of 
providence in history has kept from succeeding ages 
any thing which could cheapen any one who was con- 
nected with the Christ. 

History tells us nothing more of Lazarus. In the 
beginning of the second century many of those whom 
Jesus had both healed and raised from the dead were 
still alive, according to Quadratus and Eusebius (H. E., 
iv., 3). From this great miracle the village of Bethany 
took the name of Lazarus, and to this day is called El- 
Azariyeh or Lazariyeh. 

There are many in this day who say that if they could 
witness a real miracle they would become Christians. 
They are mistaken. There is no conceivable miracle 
more stupendous than the raising of Lazarus. Did it 
convert all beholders ? No. It had various effects upon 
the crowd of spectators. It brought to Jesus those few 



196 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

who had sufficient spiritual insight to perceive its im- 
mense meaning. It deepened the hostility of those who 
already hated Jesus. It simply amused others, who 
regarded the whole thing as a first-rate show. It accel- 
erated the death of Jesus. 






: 



XIV. 
GH&t <Ef)ttst dforetelling i^ts Heati). 



John XII. 

(20) Now there were certain Greeks among those that went up to 
worship at the feast : (21) these therefore came to Philip, which 
was of Bethsaida of Galilee, and asked him, saying, "Sir, we 
would see Jesus." (22) Philip cometh, and telleth Andrew : Andrew 
cometh, and Philip, and they tell Jesus. (23) And Jesus answereth 
them, saying, "The hour is come, that the Son of man should be 
glorified. (24) Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a grain of 
wheat fall into the earth and die, it abideth by itself alone ; but if 
it die, it beareth much fruit. (25) He that loveth his life loseth it; 
and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life 
eternal. (26) If any man serve Me, let him follow Me; and where 
I am, there shall also My servant be: if any man serve Me, him 
will the Father honor. (27) Now is My soul troubled ; and what 
shall I say? Father, save Me from this hour. But for this cause 
came I unto this hour. (28) Father, glorify Thy name." There 
came therefore a voice out of heaven, saying, "I have both glorified 
it, and ivill glorify it again." (29) The multitude therefore, that 
stood by, and heard it, said that it had thundered: others said, 
"An angel hath spoken to Him." (30) Jesus answered and said, 
" This voice hath not come for My sake, but for your sakes. (31) 
Now is the judgment of this world : now shall the prince of this 
world be cast out. (32) And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will 
draw all men unto Myself. " (33) But this He said, signifying by 
what manner of death He should die. (34) The multitude therefore 
answered Him, ' ' We have heard out of the law that the Christ 
abideth forever: and how sayest Thou, The Son of man must be 
lifted up? who is this Son of man?" (35) Jesus therefore said 
unto them, ' ' Yet a little while is the light among you. Walk while 
ye have the light, that darkness overtake you not : and he that 
walketh in the darkness knoweth not whither he goeth. (36) While 
ye have the light, believe on the light, that ye may become sons of 
light." These things spake Jesus, and He departed and hid Him- 
self from them. 



THE CHRIST FORETELLING HIS DEATH. 
THE FIRST DAY IN THE LAST WEEK. 

IT was the first day of the last week in the earthly life 
of Jesus. The resurrection of Lazarus had so 
excited the hatred of the enemies of Jesus that they 
were plotting how they might kill both Jesus and Laza- 
rus, because by the resurrection of the latter many of 
the Jews were beginning to believe on Jesus. It was 
the Passover, a feast which brought great multitudes to 
the Holy City. Many people had witnessed the great 
miracle at Bethany, and the populace were greatly 
excited. As Jesus came toward the city they gathered 
about Him until there was a vast cortege, and they 
strewed branches of palm trees in the way and waved 
them in the air, and cried: " Hosanna ! Blessed is the 
King of Israel, that cometh in the name of the Lord." 
The Messianic enthusiasm had reached its height. 
Surely, now there would be the inauguration of that 
kingdom which was to break the Roman power and 
grow into a universal and perpetual empire. 

GREEK DESIRE TO SEE JESUS. 

Jesus went into the Temple, probably passing at once 
into the "Women's Court," where the treasury-boxes 
were. At this juncture, from the crowd which had 
surged up to the holy edifice came certain Hellenes to 
Philip, one of Christ's disciples. These Hellenes were 



200 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL LNTSIGHT. 

not Jews who lived in Greece or in Greek colonies, but 
were Gentiles, real Greeks, who are described by the 
phrase " among those who were accustomed to come up 
to worship at the feast." 

Where these came from no man knows. All we can 
learn of them must be gathered from this passage. If 
they had been Greek Jews, another word would have been 
used. They were Gentiles, and had been heathen. 
Whether they had become proselytes of the gate, like 
Cornelius, we do not know, but it is probable they had. 
They plainly inherited the Greek temperament of intel- 
lectual activity. They had spiritual aspirations and 
spiritual insight. They had perceived that of the 
nations the Jews held the highest and purest form of 
faith. They had accustomed themselves to come up to 
the feast and enjoy the spiritual advantages of the occa- 
sion, as far as allowed, even although not permitted to 
partake of the Passover, because they were uncircum- 
cised. This rubric of the Jewish ritual was one of the 
latest exhibitions of the growing narrowness of the Jew- 
ish Church. JEleazar, the son of Ananias, the high 
priest, was, according to Josephus, the author of the 
canon which forbade the priests to accept any sacrifice at 
the hands of any Gentile. And Josephus says this was 
one of those things which brought down Roman wrath on 
the Jews (De Bello Jud., 1. 2, c. 30). 

These Greeks were intent upon learning all they 
could. The recent words of Jesus, and the Lazarus 
miracle, and the palm procession, seem to have conspired 
to bring them to the determination to have a personal 
interview with Jesus. They saw Philip. Philip and 
Andrew were the only Greek names among the apostles. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IXSIGHT. 201 

These Greeks may have learned that ; or the Greek lin- 
eage may have shown itself in the face of Philip; or per- 
haps they discerned spiritually that he was the man to 
whom such request might be trustfully presented. They 
made known their desire very courteously: they would 
not intrude upon the great Teacher. Nor would Philip 
be rash in carrying their requests to his Master, who 
might not desire to have another straw added to the load 
He was already carrying. But upon consultation with 
Andrew it was determined that they could not take the 
responsibility of withholding this request. They told 
Jesus. They enjoyed the blessedness of bringing others 
to Jesus, and they immortalized themselves in history. 
"Tell Jesus," and He will resolve all mental and spirit- 
ual difficulties. " We wish to see Jesus I" The desire 
of the nations is to know a Jesus. He who dies without 
seeing Jesus misses the best sight of heaven and earth. 

JESUS WISHES TO SEE THOSE WHO WISH TO 

SEE HIM. 

Jesus had just wept over Jerusalem. Coming from 
Bethany to the City of the Great King, He had paused 
on the brow of Olivet to weep over Jerusalem, and amid 
sobs to utter His pathetic valedictory: "If thou hadst 
known — in this day — even thou — the things for peace ! 
But now they are hid from thine eyes ! " Now the Gen- 
tiles turn to Him, and He turns toward the Gentiles. 

Just where Jesus uttered the next words we can only 
conjecture. It seems probable that He came out to 
where the Greeks were: they could not come to Him; it 
was not allowed. The words recorded were addressed, 
it would seem, to the disciples, in the presence of the 



202 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

Greeks and of the multitude who witnessed the going of 
Jesus to these Gentiles. Did not the coming of the 
Gentiles to Him bring forcibly to His mind the fact that 
it was to be by His death that all nations should be 
brought to God, and that that death was imminent? Did 
He connect in His mind the coming of the men from 
the East at His birth with this coming of the men from 
the West at His death? Whether this was so or not, He 
is recorded as having said: "The hour has come that 
the Son of Man should be glorified "; and He knew that 
the hour had come when the Son of Man was to be cru- 
cified. He proceeds to intimate how that glory was to 
come to Him. 

We must bear in mind the great difficulty Jesus had 
in making His disciples take in the idea of His dying. 
Whatsoever made them more certain that He was the 
Messiah made them more certain that He could not die. 
They shared the opinions and feelings of all their people 
on this subject. So when Jesus made the announce- 
ment of His death, He prefaced it with His usual solemn 
introduction to a most important asseveration: "Verily, 
verily, I say unto you, except a grain of wheat fall into 
the earth and die, it abideth by itself alone; but if it die 
it beareth much fruit. He that loveth his life loseth it; 
and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it 
unto life eternal. If any man serve Me, let him follow 
Me; and where I am there shall My servant be: if any 
man serve Me, him will My Father honor." 

''WHAT SHALL I SAY?" 

When Jesus had uttered these words, there seems to 
have come to Him one of those awful moments of spirit- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 203 

ual anguish which made much of what He suffered for 
our salvation. A great shudder passed through His 
frame, such as would pass through a ship struck by huge 
waves from opposite sides. As one has expressed it, 
it was the concurrence of the dread of death and the 
ardor of obedience. Yes, it was the clash of the human 
and divine which came from the union of the divine and 
human. " What shall I say?" He cried. He was hav- 
ing an experience which human language was wholly 
inadequate to express. There must have been some- 
thing in it which quite transcended any thing whicli 
can be in any mere departure of a human spirit from a 
human body. It made even Him to think of avoiding 
it by some method of escape. Naturally Jesus would 
look to the God that was in Him. " Shall I say: 
' Father, save Me from this hour ' ? " Then He was 
strong enough to reject such a suggestion, and He 
embodies His spiritual triumph in that prayer which is 
to be the petition of His followers in all seasons of trial: 
" Father, glorify Thy name!" Do that, and do then 
whatever may be necessary to accomplish that. 

A VOICE WHICH JESUS KNEW. 

A notable thing then occurred. A sound was heard. 
It seemed to be a voice from heaven. Three interpre- 
tations were given to it. Some said it thundered. Some 
said: " An angel has spoken to Him." Some said there 
were these words spoken: "And I have glorified and 
I will glorify." It is plain that all heard a sound. 

Jesus recognized the voice. He told the dull and 
unbelieving multitude that the voice had not come for 
His sake, but for theirs. He does not discuss their 



204 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

various interpretations. He corrects their supposition 
that the voice had come to assure His faith; it had come 
to rebuke their unbelief and want of spiritual insight. 
It settled the great controversy. He shouted as a war- 
rior might on a field of battle when a movement had 
been made which insured victory: "Now ! Now ! Notv 
is the damnation of this world ! Now is the ruler of 
this world cast out!" The "world" is all that is 
opposed to the Christ' s work of reconciliation. The 
victory to be won by His death was to be the condemna- 
tion of the judgments of the carnal intellect and the 
hostilities of the carnal heart. The devil, who leads 
these hostile forces, is to be cast out. The ruler of the 
unbelieving world is to lose his place as unbelievers 
yield to the overpowering evidence of the love of God 
furnished in Jesus. 

Living He had drawn some, but His death was to 
crown His life and complete His power. "And I, if I 
be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto My- 
self." 



XV. 
©'mine i^umiUtg— J^etsiflBasljtng. 



John XIII. 

(1) Now before the feast of the passover, Jesus knowing that His 
hour was come that He should depart out of this world unto the 
Father, having loved His own which were in the world, He loved 
them unto the end. (2) And during supper, the devil having al- 
ready put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray 
him, (3) Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into 
His hands, and that He came forth from God, and goeth unto God, 
(4) riseth from supper, and layeth aside His garments; and He 
took a towel, and girded Himself. (5) Then He poureth water into 
the basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them 
with the towel wherewith He was girded. (6) So He cometh to Simon 
Peter. He said unto Him, "Lord, dost Thou wash my feet?" (7) 
Jesus answered and said unto him, "What I do thou knowest not 
now; but thou shalt understand hereafter.'" (8) Peter saith unto 
Him, "Thou shalt never icash my feet." Jesus answered him, "If I 
wash thee not, thou hast no part with Me" (9) Simon Peter saith 
unto Him, * 'Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head." 
(10) Jesus saith to him, "He that is bathed needeth not save to wash 
his feet, but is clean every whit: and ye are clean, but not all." (11) 
For He knew Mm that should betray Him ; therefore said He, " Ye 
are not all clean." (12) So when He had washed their feet, and 
taken His garments, and sat down again, He said unto them, 
"Know ye what I have done to you? (13) Ye call Me Master 
and Lord: and ye say well; for so lam. (14) If I then, the Lord 
and the Master, have washed your feet, ye also ought to wash one 
another's feet. (15) For I have given you an example, that ye also 
should do as I have done to you. (16) Verily, verily, I say unto 
you, A slave is not greater than his master ; neither is an apostle 
greater than He that sent him. (17) If ye know these things, blessed 
are ye if ye do them." 









DIVINE HUMILITY. 

THE LAST PASSOVER. 

THE day came when Jesus had His last social inter- 
course and His last meal with His disciples. This 
most probably was Thursday evening, 6th of April, a.d. 
30, the day before His crucifixion. In the history of 
this remarkable meal there is much in the four Evan- 
gelists to excite the critical instinct, but we are em- 
ployed in these pages with what may cultivate our spirit- 
ual insight, and not in criticism upon the adjustment of 
the circumstances as related. We are specially inter- 
ested in what John supplies to complete the narrative 
as given in the other gospels. 

Jesus knew that His " hour " was approaching, so 
that whatever should be said to His disciples must be 
said promptly. John and Peter were sent by Him to 
prepare for the last Passover supper of His life. At 
His direction they went to a certain house. It is not 
known whose house : probably it was that of one of 
those described as disciples " secretly, for fear of the 
Jews." Evidently Jesus had looked forward with great 
interest to this feast. He said to the twelve, apparently 
just after they had entered the chamber : " With desire 
have I desired to eat this Passover with you before I 
suffer." Perhaps this was said while they were standing, 
a part of the ceremonial which was observed by Jews 
to remind them of the first Passover, when they were 



208 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

about to leave Egypt. John explains that speech as 
having sprung from the love of the Lord for His dis- 
ciples. 

And this is the first and last and most impressive 
lesson of the whole narrative. It is to be remembered 
that John was the intimate of Jesus and was one of the 
two who had been sent to prepare the guest- chamber for 
this occasion. Perhaps before He started Jesus told 
John that He so loved the little company of followers 
that He desired to eat with them once more. When, in 
his old age, the dear apostle wrote out this account, 
he recollected what the Lord had said, that He desired 
another occasion to manifest His aifection. 

HIS "OWN." 

"His own" — how tender that is ! Every thing be- 
longs to Him, for He made it ; every atom of matter, 
every animate thing, every human being. But His 
" own " amongst men must have some peculiar mean- 
ing. Who are in the circle of that phrase ? Must they 
not be those who perceive in Jesus something that 
specially belongs to them ? Sheep are sheep ; but when 
a shepherd looks upon great flocks of sheep, which are 
his " own "? Are they not the sheep who, if they 
were rational, the moment they hear his voice, would 
say, " That is my shepherd " ? As one such a sheep ap- 
proached its shepherd would not the shepherd say in his 
heart, " That is my sheep " ? In all ages those who 
have enough spiritual insight to connect them with 
Jesus are His "own." In the close of the canon of the 
Old Testament (Mai. iii.) we are told that those who 
feared the Lord often talked with one another about 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 209 

Him, and that their words would be kept in perpetual 
remembrance by the Lord, who calls them His " jewels ": 
" They shall be mine" saith the Lord. One's "own" 
is what he oivns, not simply what he possesses, but also 
that of which he acknowledges the possession. When 
Jesus loves, He acknowledges His beloved, and He loves 
to the end, to the perfection of love. 

What a beauty, what a high, tender, marvelous beauty 
must have come into the countenance of Jesus as He 
said, probably as they were about to sit down, ' ' With 
desire have I desired to eat this Passover with you before 
I suffer : for I say unto you that I will not eat thereof 
until the time when it shall be fulfilled in the Kingdom 
of God." Whatever they may have understood by all 
that, it was plain that this was to be the last meal before 
some great crisis. 

CAUSES OF STRIFE. 

Each of the Twelve desired to sit next to Him. And 
here arose a conflict, springing, perhaps, from selfish 
ambition ; or may it have been an unwise exhibition of 
love ? The order of the seats is not known, only that it 
appears to have been settled that John was to be on one 
side of Jesus, "leaning on the bosom of Jesus," and 
Judas on the other, " He that dips the hand with Me 
in the dish." Oh, how unseemly was this strife at this 
last meal ! How the friends of the Saviour crucify Him 
in His inmost nature, while His foes are preparing to 
nail Him to the cross ! Prince of Peace! must Thou 
always see men wrangling and quarreling and fighting 
about Thee, and from professed love of Thee ? 

Perhaps the mention of "the Kingdom of God " may 



210 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL IKSIGHT. 

have aroused their secular hopes of temporal dominion, 
and the old wish to be very prominent in the Messianic 
government may have become rampant at the intima- 
tion by the Lord that they were on the eve of some great 
crisis in His career. The order of sitting being settled, 
there arose another cause of strife. We must recall the 
conditions. In the Christ's time and country men wore 
sandals. However scrupulously a man may have made his 
toilet, including his bath, and however carefully he may 
have walked, when he came in, his feet would be so soiled 
that no meal could have been taken in comfort with the 
feet unwashed. It was the business of a host to see that 
the washing of the feet was attended to, which service 
was ordinarily performed by a slave. In the case before 
us the host seems to have neglected this point of Oriental 
etiquette. Who should wash the feet of this company 9 
That was the question which agitated the circle. We 
must bear in mind that they were all stirred by feeling 
that they were on the very edge of a stupendous change 
in their affairs, and that each must take advantage of 
his relationship to Jesus to secure his own interests in 
whatever was next to take place. In coming to the 
table they strove to see who should be greatest. Now 
they are striving to see who shall avoid being the least. 

AN IMMORTAL OBJECT-LESSON. 

It was in this connection that Jesus gave His disciples 
the immortal object-lesson of the feet-washing. His 
state of mind is described by John. 

1. He was alive with love. That was intensified by 
His feeling that He was about to depart this life. He 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 211 

was penetrated by the thought that He was to endure 
an unspeakable affliction of suffering, of all which His 
disciples were ignorant. The burden that pressed Him 
and the terrible agony which confronted Him did not so 
concenter Himself in Himself as to make Him indifferent 
to the bereavement which was about to befall His disci- 
ples and friends. While He should be in heaven they 
would be "in the world," the world that hated Him and 
would hate them. 

2. Then, the time was shortening. The devil had 
entered the heart of Judas Iscariot. There sat the 
traitor in the company of John and the others. He had 
made the bargain, and would lose little time in consum- 
mating it. 

3. Jesus was sensible of holding all things in His 
hands. His Godhead had endowed Him with omnipo- 
tence and omniscience. He could do with power all that 
could be done with power, but there are some things 
which power can not do. It can not win the hearts of 
men. Nothing but love can do that. But there can be 
no conceivable behaviour, however mean it may seem, 
that can derogate from the dignity of any being, even 
from the omnipotent, if that deed proceed from love. 
Here was a case in which human comfort was involved ; 
and, beyond that, circumstances had occasioned the need 
of a great moral lesson, a lesson on the learning of 
which depended the happiness of His own dear family 
of disciples, and of all those who should believe on His 
name through them. 

What a stupendous contrast between the third and 
fourth verses of this chapter ! He who had all things in 
His hands, who had created the world, who had como 



212 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 

out from God, and was about to return to Grod, proceeds 
to wash the feet of His disciples, not only those of John, 
who loved Him, but also those of Peter, who should 
deny Him, and of Judas, who should betray Him. 
What a sight for the angels, who had seen Him on His 
throne, who had been present when He created the 
physical universe, and who had been witnesses of His 
incarnation ! But in this new sight they perceive how 
condescending can be the love that is so divine, so con- 
stant, so immortal ! 

IMPRESSION ON THE DISCIPLES. 

Who can imagine the impression made upon the startled 
apostles as their Master arises from the table ? What 
is He about to do ? Why does He lay aside His outer 
garments ? Before they can speak, with love's alacrity 
and a divine dignity He girds Himself, just as a slave 
would. If they could have conjectured what it was He 
was about to do, would not some one of the twelve men 
in the circle have offered at least to adjust the apron 
about His person and to bring the basin ? The towel, 
or apron, and the wash-bowl were there, being part of 
the usual furniture of the guest-chamber, and left there 
by the master of the house, who was necessarily absent, 
if he was the head of a household, because he was com- 
pelled to eat the Passover with his family. 

With whom did Christ begin ? Shall this strife for 
pre-eminence be increased by the very lesson of humil- 
ity He was about to teach them ? It was not John. If 
it had been, there would have been some delicate hint 
of it somewhere in the narrative. John's character was 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 213 

of fine grain, upon the whole, while his organ of appro- 
bativeness was largely developed. He does not ever let 
his readers forget that he was the disciple whom Jesus 
loved. As this was an act of condescending service 
upon the part of Him who knew all things, and as His 
disciples would often review the events of that night as 
they passed down into old age, and would scrutinize 
every act and word, and inquire into the probable 
motives of those words and acts, would He not probably 
begin with either Peter, who should deny Him, or Judas, 
who should betray Him ? Perhaps we should say that the 
first to be approached would be Judas. He was morally 
at the bottom of the line. The devil was in Judas. He 
who already, without provocation, for the price of a slave, 
had sold a Master so pure, so noble, so lovable, may have 
been capable of having his feet washed by Jesus without 
any scrupulous objection such as exploded from Peter, 
and without breaking down and falling before Jesus, 
and clasping His precious feet, and acknowledging the 
sin into which he had been betrayed, and imploring the 
compassion of his Lord. Judas had already effectually 
committed his crime; Peter had not. 

If this conjecture be correct, then the other disciples 
must have looked on in silent astonishment at both 
Jesus and Judas, at the wonderful service performed by 
one and the sullen reception of such an exhibition of 
love by the other, for Judas had hitherto been held in 
high confidence. If Judas * was the first, then most 
probably Peter was the second. 



*After this passage was written I discovered that Chrysostom had conjec- 
tured that Judas was the first to be washed, and that he permitted it and was 
pleased to have Jesus humiliated. But let us not be too hard on Judas. 



214 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 



PETER'S OUTBURST. 

When Jesus reached Simon Peter, probably the next 
to Judas, that apostle could not contain himself. His 
impulsive nature broke loose, and he objected violently, 
as perhaps any one of the other disciples would have 
done. We should make the English order of words more 
nearly in accordance with the order in the Greek, and 
so bring out the striking contrasts, if we put the sentence 
in the form of an exclamation: "Lord, Thou washing 
my feet ! " But in the original " my " follows " Thou," 
and the contrast is as great as thought and language can 
make it. "Thou," the Son of God, the Messiah, art 
"washing," bathing as a servant would do, "me," who 
am not worthy to associate in the lowest capacity with 
One whose shoe-latchet the great John Baptist was not 
worthy to unloose ; and art washing not my face or my 
hands, but my "feet"! The emotion is all the more 
deeply intimated by its being in the form of a question, 
as if he would have said: " Think of it ! Think of my 
submitting to it ! What would be thought of a disciple 
who would let his Lord wash his soiled feet ? Who ever 
heard of such a thing ? No; it shall never be said that 
I was willing to allow that ! Rather let me wash Thy 
feet ! " 

Was this a natural expression of reverence ? Why not ? 
Is it not just what the most reverential disciple would 
say amid these circumstances ? Perhaps the tones were 
louder and the manner more impulsive than we should 
have had in Andrew or Philip, but the address itself 
seems very natural. Even now do not His disciples 
often have the same feeling ? That I should live and 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 215 

die for the Lord seems most proper, but that the Lord 
of Glory should lay aside the robes of His imperial 
majesty and take upon Him the form of a servant, and 
serve me and die for me, is sometimes almost more than 
my reverence will allow me to admit. 

THE CHRIST'S ANSWER, TO PETER. 

But the answer to modern disciples is the answer 
which the Lord gave to Peter: "What I am doing 
thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter." 
The scruples of Peter are allayed by three considera- 
tions. 

1. W T hat Jesus was doing was not merely the per- 
formance of actions visible to the natural eye, but also 
something having a deep spiritual meaning which does 
not come out at first. W"e are greatly in the dark. Our 
limitations are many. Our outlook is not large. We 
must always consider this when we are disposed to criti- 
cise the doings of our Lord and to refuse to do as He 
proposes. 

2. What is not understood at present by the disciple 
shall afterward certainly become intelligible. Growing 
Christian experience, increased spiritual insight, the 
unfolding of events, will throw light upon much that is 
now dark. "Hereafter." When, after the washing, 
Jesus entered upon discourse, when He died upon the 
cross, Avhen the Pentecostal outpouring came, then 
Peter understood it all. the great "hereafter"! 
What hoards of treasures, what chests of medicine, what 
a series of revelations, it contains for us all ! " Thou 
shalt know " should sustain us. 

3. And then there is the consideration that Jesus is 



216 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

doing it : "What / do." The fact that any thing is 
done by our Master ought to make us feel that it must 
be divinely appropriate, and that any criticism by any 
of His followers must be unspeakably impertinent. 

Very mild was the reply of the gentle Master to the 
vehement outburst of His impetuous disciple. But it 
does not quite conquer his self-will. He reiterates his 
refusal and in still more peremptory tones. He seems 
to fling aside the suggestion of "hereafter." "Thou 
shalt never wash my feet : no, never," or, as in the orig- 
inal, "to the limit of time," so that "there can never 
come a hereafter to Thy washing of my feet." No more 
positive expression of refusal can be shaped in language, 
none can be conceived. Now we have in Peter an ex- 
ample of that "pride which apes humility." Is it real 
humility to put one's self above one's Lord and Master ? 
But this is what every one does who does not perceive 
that true humility lies in instant and implicit obedience. 
This is what every man does who insists on washing his 
own feet. The Lord laid aside His robes of imperial 
majesty and stooped to wash our sins away and — we de- 
cline His service, as being too much to even think of, 
much more to accept ! 

PETER AND JUDAS. 

There was a great difference between Peter and Judas, 
the difference between frailty of temperament and de- 
generation of character. Peter was impulsive, Judas 
was corrupt. The latter had allowed the accursed lust 
for gold — " sacra auri fames " — to eat his manhood 
out, as it will always do if allowed a lodgment. An 
irreligious and immoral ritualist, he had submitted to 



THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 217 

the ceremonial, but had not received into his soul the 
sweetness of the Christly service. He had been washed, 
but had no part in Jesus. In front of that fact Jesus 
breaks down Peter's opposition by quietly saying to him : 
"If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with Me." If 
Peter had reflected a moment, that might have appeared 
to him to mean that he who does not accept Christ's 
Christly service is cut off from Christ. " Cut off from 
Christ ? " Why, that opened to the eyes of Peter a 
hell-depth down which he dare not look. Better be in 
the heart of the infernal regions with Jesus than on the 
throne of the universe without Him. This speech ap- 
pealed to the real love for Jesus, which was the most 
powerful passion in this rough man's heart, and Peter 
explodes again with ' ' Lord, not my feet only, but also 
my hands and my head." He clean takes back all his 
" No, never." He begins to perceive the spiritual mean- 
ing of the whole transaction, and this makes him feel 
the filthiness of the soil of sin which none but the Son 
of God can wash away. His conscience was unlike that 
of Judas, who reasoned from one good quality to entire 
justification of character ; from his faults Peter reasoned 
to a total condemnation of himself and the necessity of 
being spiritually washed all over. 

But all that was incidental. Jesus did not dwell on 
it. He was not insisting on the mere act of feet-wash- 
ing, nor raising it to a sacrament. The great lesson of 
the occasion was the spirit that prepares for service in 
humility. How small beside Jesus appeared that group 
of disciples who, being in the main good men, after all 
the teaching of Jesus, and all the influence of life with 
Jesus, were now under the power of the passion of am- 



218 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

bition. He teaches them the lofty lesson of humble 
service. Should it not be called Godlike ? Who is the 
most serviceable person in the universe ? God : and He 
is the grandest. Who the most serviceable among men? 
Jesus : and He is the grandest. No service to humanity 
can disparage the dignity of God or of any man. There 
is no climbing without taking the lowest step. Jesus 
emptied Himself of all glory, and took upon Him the 
form of a servant and humbled Himself. Wherefore 
God has given Him a name which is above every name. 
And the name that shall stand next to His for all eter- 
nity will be that of the person who, next to Jesus, shall 
have stooped from the greatest height to the lowliest 
position, that he might serve men. And all names shall 
follow in order on that principle. 

beautiful Humility ! ugly Self-seeking ! The 
Lord and Master washed His disciples' feet : what He 
has done for us it will be our greatest honor to do for 
one another. " If ye know these things, happy are ye 
if you do them." 



XVI. 
Jesus (ttonsolator. 



John XIV. 

(1) "Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also 
in Me. (2) In My Father's house are many mansions; if it were 
not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. 
(3) And if I go and prepare a place for you, I come again, and will 
receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also. 
(15) If ye love- Me, ye will keep My commandments. (16) And I will 
pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter, that He 
may be with you forever, (17) even the Spirit of truth: whom the 
world can not receive; for it beholdeth Him not, neither knoweth 
Him: ye know Him; for He abideth with you, and shall be in you. 
(18) I will not leave you desolate: I come unto you. (19) Yet a little 
while, and the world beholdeth Me no more; but ye behold Me: be- 
cause Hive, ye shall live also. (20) In that day ye shall know that 
I am in My Father, and ye in Me, and Iin you. (21) He that hath 
My commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me : and 
he that loveth Me shall be loved of My Father, and I will love him, 
and will manifest Myself unto him." (22) Judas {not Iscariot) saith 
unto Him, "Lord, what is come to pass that Thou wilt manifest Thy- 
self unto us, and not unto the world t " (23) Jesus answered and 
said unto him, "If a man love Me, he will keep My word: and My 
Father will love him, and We will come unto him, and make Our 
abode with him. (24) He that loveth Me not keepeth not My words: 
and the word which ye hear is not Mine, but the Father's who sent 
Me. (25) These things have I spoken unto you, while yet abiding with 
you. (26) But the Comforter, even the Holy Spirit, whom the Father 
will send in My name, He shall teach you all things, and bring to 
your remembrance all that I said unto you. (27) Peace I leave 
with you; My peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I 
unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be fearful." 



JESUS CONSOLATOK. 
STILL AT THE SUPPER. 

TTTE must remember that we are still at the supper. 

VV Judas had left. Jesus had told them that He 
was going away. Instead of founding some sort of 
ecclesiastical society, He left them one entreaty, namely, 
that they should love one another. Men should know 
that they were His disciples if they loved one another 
for His sake, and whenever they ate bread and drank 
wine together they should do it in remembrance of Him. 
Peter was puzzled at the intimation of His departure. 
So hard was it for those who loved Him to think of Him 
as going anywhere away from them, more especially 
as dying, that Peter actually offered to go wherever He 
went, and was met by the prediction that he would 
shortly deny his Lord. 

The company had a sense of impending danger, and 
gathered from the words of Jesus that they were to go 
forth. So they examined their resources and told Jesus 
that there were two swords in the room. "Enough of 
this," said Jesus. What was the use of any little arsenal 
in the possession of a little company of Galileans as 
measured against the Eoman power ? He was not talk- 
ing of any such childish resistance. He was simply 
striving to prepare their minds for His departure out of 
this world. We read this history in the illumination of 
subsequent events. These poor men, it must be remem- 
bered, were without any such aid. They were tossed 



222 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

with trouble. Their best friend saw that and began to 
console them. 

TEXT OF THE DISCOURSE: TROUBLE. 

The text of His discourse was this : The sore of the 
world is a trouble : the cure of a troubled heart is faith. 

How manifold are the causes of heart-trouble ! But 
whenever and from whatever it may come, it sometimes 
presents the picture of the heart as a loose, unmanaged 
vessel on a rough sea driven about by strong and chang- 
ing winds, a ship which needs anchorage ; sometimes 
the picture is that of a sick man shaking with ague or 
tossed by convulsions. These poor disciples were like 
sick men aboard a frail and beaten bark. 

Look at the causes of their troubles. They had for- 
saken all and devoted themselves to this new prophet. 
They had believed that this was He who should deliver 
Israel. They had seen Him exhibit superhuman power. 
They had heard Him speak as never man spake. They 
had associated with Him for three years. They had 
learned to love Him with a passion which made them 
willing to die for Him. They had felt that He was 
kingly in His very nature, and had cherished Messianic 
hopes which included the national deliverance. Each 
man of them regarded Jesus as his chief friend. The 
world would be empty and dark and objectless if Jesus 
were taken away. And now He seemed about to go. 

And His departure was to be marked by the fall of 
one and the treachery of another of their company; and 
the kingdom they expected was not to be set up ; and 
alone, and without His presence and aid, they were to 
cope with foes whose hatred of them and of Jesus was 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 223 

increasing daily ; and the future of desolation and dis- 
appointment and dreariness confronted their spirits. 

Then spake the Consoler. His very tones were tender. 
He had known what it was to have His heart troubled. 
He was acquainted with griefs. (See John xi., 33, and 
xiii., 21). He does not blame them for being troubled, 
but He points them to sources of consolation. 

CONSOLATIONS. 

The first and greatest is faith. The very mention of 
" heart " intimates that they will feel sorrow. It is of 
nature that they should ; but it is of the grace of faith 
that they should not allow any sorrow, of memory or of 
anticipation, to beat them down and so demoralize them 
as to unfit them for duty. " Let not your heart be 
troubled." Others might ; but they had the help of 
faith. " Ye believe in God and ye believe in Me " : 
that would save them in sorrow. See how He couples 
thought of Himself with thought of God. He who 
believes in God really and truly must believe in Jesus 
when he sees Him. Any man in Christendom who does 
not believe in Jesus can not believe thoroughly in God. 
That is a simple fact which goes a great way to confirm 
thoughtful men in the divinity of Jesus. The greatest 
proof that there is a God is not furnished by nature, but 
comes to man in the existence of such a personality as 
that of Jesus. The belief in God necessitates the belief in 
some one like Jesus ; and there is no accounting for Jesus 
without postulating the idea of an infinite, good God. 

Those who believe in Jesus have both God and Jesus; 
all that is in manhood, all that is in godhood. With such 
a helper and friend, how could they succumb to trouble ? 



224 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

It is as if He had said, "Whosesoever heart is troubled, 
let not yours be : ye are Mine : if I came all the way out 
of heaven to you at My incarnation, is not that proof 
that I will come to you whenever I am needed by you ?" 
He had taught them that the Father so loved the world 
as to give the Son, and the Son so loved the world as to 
come in the flesh for its redemption ; and incomprehen- 
sible as it was, it was true — that the Father and the Son 
never parted company. With such divine relationship 
the disciples of Jesus should never allow themselves to 
be overwhelmed. He was going to be absent from the 
field of physical vision, it is true ; but His disciples must 
learn that the departures of Jesus are as valuable to the 
world as the coming of Jesus, even as the sunsets are as 
useful to men as the sunrise. 

THE ROOTS OF TROUBLE. 

Then He went to the roots of their fearful troubles, 
which were ambition and a sense of desolation at the 
departure of Jesus, a feeling of homelessness, as though 
they were to be wanderers forever. " In My Father's 
house are many mansions." What comfort in this am- 
plitude and permanence ! And that comfort remains for 
us to-day. Does a servant of the Lord find himself 
with great gifts working in some lonely poor little mis- 
sion-field with scarcely enough to keep soul and body 
together, while a less gifted brother is an archbishop 
with tens of thousands of dollars annually for salary, 
let him not be torn in spirit. The realm of God is so 
large that there is room enough to furnish an empire to 
each of His followers. And here the disciples are in 
training and must often be in camps and tents amid 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IXSIGHT. 225 

all the inconveniences of such a life. But each shall 
have his mansion there. The comfort is : 

1. That each shall have his own house. Heaven 
would be a very undesirable place if each were to be 
huddled with all, and there could be no sense of own- 
ness. Everlasting publicity would soon reduce heaven 
to an Inferno. In this world it is a dreadful state of 
circumstances which does not allow to each member of 
the family a place of retreat, be it ever so small, in 
which he may have his silent hour for self-culture. 

2. His place will be fitted to each spirit. We can not 
secure that here. For my own part, I have never yet 
seen any house which would entirely suit me for a home. 
That which is the nearest approach to it is the house 
out of which poor Maximilian went to his doom in 
Mexico. But a week's residence, doubtless, would make 
suggestion of alterations to render it more convenient. 
But Jesus has gone to prepare your place and mine. He 
knows exactly what will suit us. An unincarnate God 
might never have known how to do this, but the Christ 
knows. It will be ours, and as we develop in eternity 
we may improve on it so that it will always suit us. 

3. It will remain. Every home on earth passes away. 
In America especially homes are transitory. Among all 
my acquaintances, at this moment I can recall but one 
gentleman who is living in the house in which he was 
born. But the home which our Lord is now preparing 
will be " eternal in the heavens." 

A WIDE HOPE. 

There is a wide, general hope given to those who 
follow Jesus. It involves an important principle, which 



226 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

is this: If we have desire for anything in eternity which 
is not forbidden in the Holy Scriptures, we may expect 
it; and desire with expectation is what makes hope. 
" Too good to be true ? " Why, the better any thing is 
the more likely it is to come to pass. Whatever shall 
be needful for your happiness there, you may be sure 
that you will find there. A little girl was much devoted 
to her toy of Noah's ark. One day she asked her mother 
with some solicitude whether she would have a Noah's 
ark in heaven. Her unwise mother was shocked at the 
idea, and exclaimed: "No, never; there are no such 
foolish things in heaven ! " The natural answer of the 
child was: "Then I think Fd rather go to the other 
place." If the mother had believed what Jesus said, she 
would have taught the child that when she passed into 
the heavenly state, if she needed a Noah's ark to make 
her happy she would find it there. The Lord never 
disappoints His trusting followers. 

Then there is a special hope granted, the hope of the 
preservation of each one's individuality: "for you." 
You will not soon be lost in a great swirl of beings. 
There will be no absorption into all "being." The 
perfection of the promise is that it holds out the hope 
of individual consciousness, the consciousness of individ- 
ual happiness. 

"I go." That was the main cause of their grief. 
But He assures His disciples that His going is as much 
for their good as His coming. Indeed, the coming 
would end in no good without the going. Good Friday 
should be as much of a spiritual festival as Christmas. 
The language of trust should be: "The Lord has come, 
and the Lord has gone; blessed be the name of the Lord!" 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 227 

" I am coming/' This is speaking very emphatically. 
It unites the present with the future. If my friend 
makes a journey to bring me any thing, his very depart- 
ure is a portion of the journey, and I should not be torn 
by the fact that he is going. He can not come back if 
he do not go. Jesus said, " I am coming/' not, " I will 
come." As my friend goes farther and farther from me 
he telegraphs to me, " I am coming back in six weeks," 
or Si as soon as I can." So, ever since that day in which 
the Lord was taken up out of the sight of His disciples 
He has been calling back to His people, " I am coming." 
When they begin to be .lonely and despondent, when 
they feel deserted and lost, they hear the voice of the 
Lord saying, " I am coming." 

THE TENDEREST SPEECH. 

And then the tenderest thing which man or God can 
say to his beloved: " I will take you to myself " — not 
simply will allow you to come, but will embrace and 
draw you, " that where I am ye may be also." As if 
He had said: "Is your love for Me so great that life is 
not worth living without Me ? Let Me tell you that 
you are so dear to Me that heaven is not heaven without 
you. You need not fear that we shall be separated for- 
ever." What larger, sweeter, more human and more 
divine comfort could His disciples desire or their Master 
give ? 

When Jesus told them that whither He went they 
knew, and also knew the way, there came an interrup- 
tion. It was from that honest skeptic, Thomas. Peter 
had wanted to know whither his Master was going; 
Thomas wanted to know the way. It gave Jesus another 



228 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

opportunity of saying what He had taught before, that 
He was the only way to the Father. This is one of the 
fundamental truths of Christianity: there is no way to 
the Father except through Jesus. The mention of the 
Father draws out Philip with his " Lord, show us the 
Father, and it sufficeth us." And this gave Jesus 
another opportunity to assert His claim to being the very 
God and Father of Eternity, as Isaiah had called Him. 
" Have I been so long time with you and yet hast thou 
not known Me, Philip ? He that hath seen Me hath 
seen the Father." This is another fundamental truth 
of Christianity: there is no God that is not in Jesus. 
He who sees Jesus sees God; he who speaks to Jesus 
speaks to God. Every word of Jesus is a word of God 
(vs. 10). So true is this that He gives power to His 
disciples to do greater works than His miracles. The 
conversion of a soul is greater than raising a dead man. 
Moral works are greater than miracles, because the 
former are wrought in the indestructible plane of spirit, 
while the latter are concerned with perishable matter; the 
former are always beneficial, the latter may be punitive, 
as were the miracles in Egypt; the former are wrought 
by the divine power of truth moving the free-will of 
man, while the latter are simply the product of the 
exercise of the autocratic will of God. And the promise 
was fulfilled. 

ANOTHER COMFORTER. 

That He may fill up their cup of comfort, Jesus 
promises to His disciples another Comforter. Mark, it 
is not "another" in the sense of different, but in the 
sense of added. On the way to the heavenly mansions 



THE GOSPEL OE SEiRiTtJAL IKSlGfiT. 229 

they should have peace, love, power, the intercourse of 
prayer, the satisfaction of obedience, and an added 
Comforter. Jesus called Him " Paraclete," a name so 
full of the meaning of many things we need that we 
can not translate it by any one English word. But His 
blessed offices are indicated. (1.) He is spirit. Christ's 
bodily appearance can not remain on earth forever. If 
He stayed He could be but in one place at a time, and 
would be as much invisible to all His disciples who were 
not there as if He were in heaven. The Spirit remain- 
eth and can be everywhere present, because He is 
spirit. (2.) He is teacher. He led the Apostles into 
the whole truth into which Jesus had given them some 
insight, and so the canon of the Scripture was made 
complete, so that not another thing is to be written for 
our instruction. He still abides with all who love and 
obey Jesus, and brings still increasing light out of the 
unalterable truth of sacred Scripture. (3.) He is to be 
an advocate. Advocate is Latin, Paraclete is Greek. 
Both mean the same thing, and when applied to an in- 
dividual mean "one that is called to the side." If I 
have trouble in the courts, because I am not skilled in 
law I call to my side one who is competent to meet my 
opponent and to secure my rights under the law. And 
he comforts me by making me feel that he stands be- 
tween me and harm, just as Jesus stood between His 
disciples and harm, and was their Paraclete. (4.) And 
He is Christ's advocate. He takes the things of the 
absent Jesus and shows them to me, and makes me see 
the claims of my Lord to my obedient love as I should 
not otherwise perceive them. (5.) His active presence 
among men should make a line of demarcation. " The 



230 the Gospel of spiritual insight. 

world," in the New Testament, embraces all those who 
do not yield to the Holy Spirit and devote themselves to 
Jesus. It has always been as it is now. There are those 
who can not receive what they do not perceive with 
their bodily senses. Jesus says they are agnostics. 
The gnostics, those who know spiritual things, are 
those who go for their knowledge to the highest and 
surest source, consciousness. " Ye know Him." Why ? 
How ? Have Christ's disciples any greater logical 
power than other men ? JS"o. Sometimes they do not 
have as much. But it does not require logical ability to 
know that of which I am conscious. All the arguments 
possible to thought could not make me believe that that 
did not exist of which I have positive consciousness. It 
may require an argument to prove to me that Socrates 
succumbed to hemlock, but I know when I have a tooth- 
ache, because I am conscious of the pain. A man 
knows that he has life by his consciousness of living. 
" I believe in the Holy Ghost " as I believe in my life : 
in both cases my belief rests on my consciousness. 

ANOTHER WORD OF SWEETNESS. 

And the Christ added another word of .sweetness : " I 
will not leave you orphans : I am coming to you." A 
child's father may go across the seas, but the child does 
not feel orphaned ; the father keeps writing, "I am 
coming." He is not an orphan till his parent dies. 
Jesus says that His disciples are not orphans. He is 
visiting them. The Father is visiting them. The 
Holy Spirit keeps up their relationship with the Father. 
The world would see Him entering Peter's house, or 
Mary's, when He was in the flesh, but when departed, 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 231 

as to His fleshly presence, the world could not see His 
visits to His disciples, but if they kept in loving obedi- 
ence to Him, then the Father would love them. God 
can not keep from loving with a special love all those 
who love Jesus, because love begets love, and all who 
love Jesus love God. The Father's love leads Him to 
His children ; so, says Jesus, "if a man love Me he will 
keep My words : and My Father will love him : and We 
will come unto Him : and make Our abode with Him. " 
"We," Father and Son, will abide with the disciple 
who has the Holy Spirit. This is the reply of Jesus to 
the question of Judas Thaddeus (Matt, x., 3) : "Lord, 
how is it that Thou wilt manifest Thyself to us and not 
unto the world ? " 

It is to be noticed how the spiritual world revolves 
around Jesus. " Whatsoever ye shall ask in My name 
that will / do, that the Father may be glorified in the 
Son. If ye shall ask any thing in My name I will do 
it" (vs. 13, 14). That is either the talk of a blabbering 
idiot or the language of the one Eternal God. When 
any thing is asked to promote what He wishes pro- 
moted, is asked for Himself, to be carried to Him, as 
my messenger brings to me what I send him for. It 
shall come. It can not be refused. And Jesus says He 
will do it, not that the Father will do it separate from 
the Son, but that He — Jesus — will be doing it, because 
the Father will be answering the prayer. The Son is 
the very glory of the Father. " I will pray the Father 
and He shall give you." Of course. Prayer is the real 
desire of the Spirit. What Jesus wishes God wishes. 
What God wishes God does. 

And see in what arms of divine love the Master wraps 



232 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

His disciples. The consummation of all is, "I am in 
the Father and ye in Me and I in you." Now, how can 
the heart of the disciple be torn? Distresses, strifes, 
imprisonments, losses, bereavements, will smite the sen- 
sibilities of the disciple for a season ; but he will not be 
troubled. He believes in God, He believes in Jesus, 



XVII. 
QLty Uine ana tije iStanrijes. 



John XV. 

(1) lam the true vine, and My Father is the husbandman. (2) 
Every branch in Me that beareth not fruit, He taketh it away: and 
every branch that beareth fruit, He cleanseth it, that it may bear 
more fruit. (3) Already ye are clean because of the word which I 
have spoken unto you. (4) Abide in Me, and 1 in you. As the 
branch can not bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; so 
neither can ye, except ye abide in Me. (5) i" am the vine, ye are the 
branches. He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same beareth 
much fruit: for apart from Me ye can do nothing. (6) If a man 
abide not in Me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and 
they gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. 
(7) If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask wlmtsoever 
ye will, and it shall be done unto you. (8) Herein is My Father 
glorified, that ye bear much fruit; and so shall ye be My disciples. 
(9) Even as the Father hath loved Me, I also have loved you: abide 
ye in My love. (10) If ye keep My commandments, ye shall abide in 
My love; even as I have kept My Father's commandments, and 
abide in His love. (11) These things have I spoken unto you, that 
My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be fulfilled. (12) 
This is My commandment, that ye love one another, even as I have 
loved you. (13) Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay 
down his life for his friends. (14) Ye are My friends, if ye do the 
things which I command you. (15) No longer do I call you servants; 
for the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth: but I have called 
you friends; for all things that I heard from My Father I have 
made known unto you. (16) Ye did not choose Me, but I chose you, 
and appointed you, that ye should go and bear fruit, and that your 
fruit should abide: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in My 
name. He may give it you. 



THE VINE AND THE BEANCHES. 
THE SUPPER ENDED. 

THE supper had ended. Judas Iscariot had gone. 
Jesus had delivered a most consoling address to 
His disciples, answering the questions of Simon Peter, 
and Thomas, and Philip, and Judas Thaddeus. And 
the whole company had sung perhaps a part or the 
whole of the Great Hallel, which comprised the 115th, 
the 116th, the 117th and the 118th Psalms. Jesus had 
said, " Arise, let us go hence." 

Now, whether He lingered, with a sad reluctance to 
leave the room in which He was having His last meet- 
ing with His disciples, or had passed into the open air, 
to go through the city down to the Kedron Valley, we 
do not know. But His heart was full, and it seemed 
eager to relieve itself by giving utterance to such last 
words as could be spoken before His departure. 

Various conjectures have been made as to what sug- 
gested the image which gave form to the opening of 
this immortal discourse. Some have supposed that prob- 
ably a vine growing near the house had some of its 
branches brushed against the window by the night- wind; 
others, that the great vine carved over the golden gate 
of the Temple gave the suggestion ; others, that Jesus 
and His disciples were walking through the vineyards 
and the sight of the vines led to the use of this figure. 
Quite as reasonable as any of these is the suggestion that 



236 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL IHSIGHT. 

the fact that they had been drinking of the juice of the 
grape was sufficient to suggest the vine. But why beat 
about ? Was not nature perpetually inspiring the 
speeches of the Master ? And had not this figure been 
rendered venerable to the Old Testament ? (Read Isaiah 
v., Jeremiah ii., Ezekiel xv. and xix., and Psalm lxxx.) 
Throughout His teachings our Lord had been endeav- 
oring to impress upon the minds of His followers the 
close connection between Himself and His " own." The 
"coin" showed property, the "sheep" both property 
and living interest, the " son " still greater closeness, 
living interest and kinship; and now the "vine" sets 
forth a real vital oneness between the Master and the 
disciples. The whole discourse is full of lessons, of 
promises, and of warnings. 

THE DISCOURSE OF THE VINE. 

The first statement is measurelessly broad. The uni- 
verse is the vineyard. God the Father is the possessor 
of the vineyard, the planter of the vine, the trimmer of 
the branches, the owner of the fruit. In the universe 
He hath planted His Son as the Vine. So Jesus now 
asserts Himself to be. By Him all things exist. He 
is the one, onely Vine, the Vine, that which is the 
"true," the archetypal Vine, all others growing out of 
this Vine. All the worlds are clusters growing on this 
Vine. Every visible thing has come forth as a branch, 
a cluster, or a single grape, from this Vine. By it all 
things were made. For it all things exist. The visible 
has grown out of the invisible. There had been nothing 
seen if there had not first been something unseen. In 









THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 237 

the beginning was the Word. The Word is the Vine. 
There was no fruit in the universe before the Vine. 

Another lesson. There is not any thing which can 
take care of itself, not even the branches which grow in 
the Vine which God has planted. They must be cared 
for. The Vine gives the life : the Husbandman cares 
for the branches which spring into life from the sap of 
the Vine. Every thing would go to destruction if not 
attended to. That is a universal law governing all 
things that are made. 

It follows that the Father's government of the world 
is a government of personal attention. We can not con- 
ceive the beginning of the universe without a Person, 
but we can conceive that some Infinite Person made the 
universe like a chronometer, wound up His mighty 
clock, and then let it run until it should run down, Him- 
self meanwhile sitting apart in majestic indifference. 
But that is not the government of God. He pays per- 
sonal attention to every branch on His Vine, just as any 
vine-dresser who is the owner of the vine. 

THE CHRIST IS GOD'S ONLY VINE. 

The great truth, central to all science, central to all 
philosophy, central to all religion, is this : God's only 
Vine is Jesus Christ. There is nothing in the universe 
but Himself and His Vine. There is nothing to care 
for but that which grows on this Vine. This Vine is 
simply God's substance, that which stands under every- 
thing. The common vine in our vineyards is a type of 
the constitution of the universe. On the vine are 
branches, some that bear fruit and some that do not. 



238 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

Each one receives attention, and each is treated accord- 
ing to its character. 

FRUITLESS BRANCHES. 

1. There are those that do not bear fruit. The 
branch does not exist for itself, but for the grapes it 
may grow upon itself. It is of no use without fruit. 
Those things which do not bear fruit are those which 
are not producing that which they were created to pro- 
duce. The moment they reach that point their existence 
is a superfluity. Whatever is fruitless is needless : 
whatever is needless is obstructive : whatever is obstruct- 
ive should be removed. So the husbandman cuts off 
the fruitless branches. The law of the universe is to 
sweep away "every branch" " that beareth not fruit." 
The forces of nature, which means the energies of God 
in action, everywhere in matter vigorously work apart 
and together, to remove what has ceased to discharge its 
prescribed functions. The moment a man's spirit 
leaves his body, the very agencies which have been at 
work to repair that body turn in upon it and energetic- 
ally exert themselves to "take away" that body, to 
remove it from its place in the world. If the skill of 
men shall contrive to preserve its semblance, it serves 
but to show what an impertinence a mummy is. So it 
is in society. When any civil or religious institution, 
any school or church, or court, or camp, or factory, 
or custom, ceases to discharge its ordained function, it is 
swept away. 

FRUITFUL BRANCHES. 

2. But there are branches that bring forth fruit. 
They also receive the attention of the Vine-Dresser. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 239 

Them He "purges." The microbes on the skin of the 
grape are harmful if they penetrate. They must be 
removed. All accretions, all superfluous products, all 
"suckers," all things that do not help to produce more 
fruitfulness, must be removed, and the husbandman 
carefully sees to their removal, by all necessary processes, 
however painful these would be to the vine, if the vine 
had human sensitiveness. 

Every process in nature is carried forward that every 
thing may increase in fruitfulness. So is it in the 
spiritual world. 

It has always been important that the distinction 
between fruitfulness and usefulness be maintained. It 
was never more important than in this day of extraor- 
dinary activity. The tendency is sometimes to miscon- 
ceive the meanings of the words, and sometimes to con- 
found the ideas represented by them, and generally to 
transpose their relations. Let us classify our ideas. A 
branch on a vine is "fruitful" in proportion as it bears 

(1) grapes that are (2) good; but the fruitfulness is in 
itself A branch becomes "useful" in proportion (1) 
to the number of grapes it gives to the consumer, and 

(2) the quality of those grapes: for the usefulness is to- 
ward others. The usefulness is not the cause of the fruit- 
fulness, because the branch can not be useful before it 
is fruitful: the fruitfulness is the cause of the useful- 
ness. An unfruitful branch can not be useful. 

Will the reader please go carefully over the preceding 
paragraph and transfer its ideas to the spiritual life ? 
The Great Teacher does not talk of usefulness, but of 
fruitfulness. Young disciples are often inflamed with 
an ardent desire to be useful, and so exhaust themselves 



240 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

in striving to be useful that they cease to be fruitful; 
and then their efforts come to naught. And sometimes 
older Christians are discouraged because they seem to be 
" doing " so little, while perhaps in their seclusion or 
even isolation the Holy Spirit is ripening them into a 
fruitage which must produce usefulness. 

ABIDING IN HIM. 

In the most excellent sense His disciples, Jesus de- 
clares, are the branches of that Vine which He is. Noth- 
ing could more distinctly indicate the intimacy between 
them than the figure here employed. Who can tell just 
where the branch begins ? Who can tell just where the 
sap has left the cellular tissues of the vine and entered 
those of the branch ? 

" Ye are the branches," He said. And they had been 
"purged." One of the company of twelve had been cut 
off by a word which Jesus had spoken. They had all 
undergone a trimming process by all the words He had 
spoken to them. They were not perfect; no branch 
that is newly trimmed is; but they were in condition to 
bear much fruit. Now follows the most important 
exhortation: "Abide in Me." Observe that word trans- 
lated "abide" occurs ten times in seven verses, being 
translated "continue" in the ninth verse. 

What is it to remain or abide or continue in Him ? 
The Master explains that: it is having the word of the 
Lord to abide in us. Certainly this can not mean a 
mere familiarity with the verbiage, the literal words in 
which He conveyed His thoughts. That may be a mere 
result of a retentive memory. The most accomplished 
liar I ever knew was so familiar with Hebrew Scripture 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL LNSIGHT. 241 

that he could quote the whole body of those writings in 
the original, and could give you chapter and verse for 
any phrase you might furnish in Hebrew. The preacher 
who was accustomed to quote more Scripture, also with 
chapter and verse, than any other man to whom I ever 
listened, acknowledged to me and others that he had 
always been a liar and a thief, and while I write this is 
under trial for an outrage on one of his female parish- 
ioners. In these cases the word of the Lord was merely 
hung up in the memory of the men and did not " dwell 
in them richly," as the Apostle recommended it should, 
and as it eminently did in that great preacher, Thomas 
Chalmers, who almost never quoted a passage of Script- 
ure in his sermons, which are saturated with the word 
and Spirit of the Lord. Beware of trusting to mere 
memory of Bible passages. To abide in Christ we must 
have the relation of the branch to the vine, the sap of 
the one passing through and through the other. The 
Master furnishes the reason for this persistent remaining 
in Him. 

REASONS FOR ABIDING. 

1. There is no spontaneous goodness in a man, any 
more than there is grape-sap in a vine-branch, unless 
that sap be shot into the branch from the vine. The 
branch can not produce it "of itself" (vs. 4). No 
human being ever produces a good thought or word or 
deed without Christ. "Apart from Me ye can do 
nothing " (vs. 5). The whole physical, intellectual, spir- 
itual organism of the branch may remain intact, yet 
when cut from the vine it loses the power to produce 
fruit. 



242 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

2. For spiritual power the branch must abide in the 
Vine. "If ye abide in Me and My words abide in you/' 
if the vital relation between the vine and the branches 
be maintained, ' ' ye shall ask what ye will and it shall 
be done unto you" (vs. 7). He had already told them 
(xiv., 13, 14) that if they should ask any thing in His 
name, He would do it. And He repeats this in xv., 16. 
Keeping vital connection with Christ produces in us such 
prayers as are proper, and secures answered prayers for 
us. In a proper spiritual state we shall not ask from 
frivolousness nor from selfishness. We shall ask only for 
those things which Jesus desires. Our approaches to 
the Father will be simply as errands from the Son. 
Take care that "In His Name" do not degenerate into 
a mere magical phrase with which to conjure. 

3. Thus, and thus only, shall be secured to us 
branches that which is the object of our existence, 
namely, fullness and richness of fruitfulness (vs. 5, 8). 

4. Thus, and thus only, shall we branches " continue 
in the love " of the Father and the Son. On the brink 
of departure Jesus speaks of what His feelings had 
been toward His disciples. He had loved them as He 
had loved Himself, which He thus expresses : "As the 
Father hath loved Me so have I loved you. " His love 
for us, not our love for Him, is that in which He exhorts 
us to abide. There is no such deliciousness of existence 
for a human soul as the sense of dwelling in the cer- 
tainty that it enjoys the personal love of the Lord Jesus 
Christ. 

5. This inestimable privilege secures us that joy 
which our Lord enjoys. If we remain in His love, His 
joy will remain in us. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 243 

6. And thus we shall bring glory to God, the one ob- 
ject for which He lives being to fill the world with 
fruitfulness. For this He planted that Vine which is 
Jesus. To this the energies of the godhead are bent. 
Every single man who brings himself more and more 
nearly to the full and perfect discharge of all those func- 
tions for which he was intended does thus more and 
more justify the existence of himself and of God. 

A TONIC. 

It is worth while to administer a tonic to our desire 
to abide in Christ by considering the dreadful fate of 
those who do not. The possibility of falling from grace 
is most distinctly stated by our Lord in vs. 7 : "If any 
one will not abide in Me." Here comes the difference 
between a vine-branch and a Christ-disciple. The latter 
has will-power. The branch may be torn from the 
vine, but no power in the universe can separate a disci- 
ple from Christ. But he may separate himself. If the 
branch could think and feel and will, it might refuse 
to receive the vine's sap. What would follow ? Just 
what follows in the case of the disciple who does not 
will to keep open the spiritual avenues between himself 
and his Saviour. 

1. It is "cast forth/' shed from the vine. It may 
hang a little while, as a disciple may hang by church 
membership and external ceremonial, but at last it must 
drop away. 

2. Then there is no more sap and it withers. It 
dries up. It can not bring forth another single grape. 

3. Then it is gathered up with other dead things. 
That tremendous police-force in the material world, 



244 THE GOSPEL OE SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

which removes all matter which has come into a useless 
form, is paralleled in the spiritual world by what may be 
called resistless pneumatic dynamics, which Jesus calls 
"His angels." Here He is describing last things, and 
uses a change of tense which imparts great vividness to 
the picture. "If any one shall not have abided in Me 
he has been cast out like the branch, and is withered, 
and they (Christ's angel-forces) gather them together 
and cast them into the fire and it burns," not "is 
burned" but naturally, like the dead sweepings of a 
vineyard, a spirit out of Christ has an affinity for de- 
struction. At the end of the grape harvest, how easy 
it is to consume the old long-dead branches that have 
fallen from the vine ; but who has ever been able to burn 
a living branch on a living vine ? 



XVIII. 
SH)e Consummate Consolation. 



John XVI. 
(1) These things have I spoken unto you, that ye should not be 
made to stumble. (2) They shall put you out of the synagogues: 
yea, the hour cometh, that whosoever killeth you shall think that 
he offereth service unto God. (3) And these things will they do, be- 
cause they have not known the Father, nor Me. (4) But these 
things have I spoken unto you, that when their hour is come, ye 
may remember them, how that I told you. And these things I said 
not unto you from the beginning, because I was with you. (5) But 
now I go unto Him that sent Me; and none of you asketh Me, 
Whither goest Thou? (6) But because I have spoken these things 
unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart. (7) Nevertheless I tell you 
the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not 
away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if J go, I will 
send Him unto you. (8) And He, when He is come, will convict 
the world in respect of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: 
(9) of sin, because they believe not in Me; (10) of righteousness, be- 
cause I go to the Father, and ye behold Me no more; (11) of judg- 
ment, because the prince of this world hath been judged. (12) I 
have yet many things to say unto you, but ye can not bear them 
now. (13) Howbeit when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He shall 
guide you into all the truth: for He shall not speak from Himself; 
but what things soever He shall hear, these shall He speak: and He 
shall declare into you the things that are to come. (14) He shall 
glorify Me: for He shall take of Mine, and shall declare it unto 
you. (15) All things whatsoever the Father hath are Mine: there- 
fore said I, that He taketh of Mine, and shall declare it unto you. 



CONSUMMATE CONSOLATION. 
FOREWARNING. 

JESUS still lingered, striving to console the company 
of the disciples on whom had fallen the shadow of 
the impending bereavement. He knew what they would 
encounter because of their loyalty to Him and to the 
truth which He had taught them N No effect of the 
strain upon them was to be deplored except the possi- 
bility that it might cause them to fall away. It was 
very natural for the departing Master to consider that 
result, because it was very natural that that should be 
the effect on their minds. When a person of ordinary 
modesty finds himself holding views which are opposed 
by Church and State, the former regarding them as he- 
retical and the latter holding them to be dangerous, what 
more natural than that he should suspect that after all 
he may be wrong, even if taught by the most gifted 
teacher ? 

So He told them in advance that both excommunica- 
tion and martyrdom awaited them, the former from the 
Church and the latter from the State. They did not 
have the lessons of the ages. They did not know that 
the Wesleys, the Luthers, the Savonarolas, who were to 
be excommunicated by the Church, would do more for 
truth and man and God than all the archbishops and 
popes who remained behind them. They knew only the 
Jewish Church and its ecclesiastical authority. To 



248 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL IKSIGHT. 

come under its ban was intolerable damnation. It migbt 
well shake their faith in their own convictions. So He 
forearmed by forewarning them. 

It does seem inconceivable that any body of men, 
animated by any religion, could bring themselves to 
believe that in murdering a man for his beliefs they 
were actually so pleasing the Heavenly Father that He 
would accept the homicide as a sacrifice atoning for 
their own sins; yet we know that churchly fanaticism has 
set forth the doctrine that " he who sheds the blood of 
a heretic is equal to him who makes a sacrificial offering." 
But the Lord told them that it would come to pass, and 
He told them — what we can now see — that whatever 
plea in mitigation of their conduct may be made for 
religious persecutors, that conduct arises from lack of 
spiritual insight: " They have not known the Father, 
nor Me." 

A VALEDICTORY. 

After this warning He utters His valedictory : " Now 
I go to Him that sent Me." That was the knell of fate 
to them. There was a dead silence in the room. No 
man cared to know any thing further. Earlier they had 
had their questions ; but if they were to be deprived of 
Him what use was there for any further interrogatory ? 
Yes, a sorrow had fallen on them which excluded all 
interest in any other thing. He gone, all would be gone. 
Sorrow is often selfish. They made no account of the 
fact that He was returning to the Father. And He 
rather chided them for their silence. But He loved 
them and sought to comfort them with human tender- 
ness and divine wisdom. " It is expedient — expedient 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 249 

for you"; as if He would assure them that His going 
was no act of selfishness, but sprang as much from self- 
sacrifice as did His coming. 

Looking back through the centuries, we can see how 
" expedient " for the whole world that Jesus should not 
have remained on the earth in the flesh. Fancy Him 
still alive in the flesh, a man eighteen hundred years 
old ! What a monstrosity ! If He remained in one 
place, say Jerusalem, He would as effectually have been 
absent from the great body of the human race as if He 
were in heaven. If He went to new places there would 
be difficulty in establishing His identity. His bodily 
presence would have ceased to be useful : and it is 
always " expedient" to be rid of the useless. 

The comfort of the disciples immediately around was 
not to outweigh the work He was to do for the world. 
That work could not be finished if He stayed in the 
flesh upon earth. There are two verbs in vs. 7 to be 
noticed. That which is translated i( go away ** gives the 
proper meaning of the original, " depart," but that 
which is translated "depart" does not look back upon 
that which is left but upon that which is in advance. 
" It is expedient for you that I depart, for if I depart not 
the Paraclete will not come, but if I go I will send Him 
to you." That is what the world needs, the perpetual 
presence of that which can everywhere be present at 
all times, and this no material body can be ; but a 
spirit may. The dispensation of spirit is the only 
assurance of the continuance of spiritual religion. The 
promise of the Paraclete is the supreme consolation, 
because He would do for the world that which no per- 
sonal presence of any preachers or miracle-workers 



1 

250 THE GOSPEL OP SPIEITUAL IKSIGHT. 

could possibly do ; no, not even the Son of God, while in 
bodily presence. 

THE HOLY SPIRIT AND THE WORLD. 

The great errors of the world are mistakes as to sin, 
as to righteousness, and as to judgment. The Holy 
Spirit would refute these errors. The verb which de- 
scribes His work is very difficult to translate into our 
language. The common version has "reprove," which is 
very feeble. The revised version has " convince," which 
gives the meaning only partially. It is a term of logic 
and of law. It always involves the refutation of error 
by the presentation of truth. The prosecutor makes 
out his case by refuting the supposition that the accused 
is innocent, the advocate by refuting the supposition 
that the accused is guilty. The verb used here some- 
times implies that process which shows what is the real 
question and what is true of the matter under discussion. 
The Master teaches that the Holy Spirit would convince 
and convict " the world" of sin. 

SIN. 

1. Men should be made to feel that there is such a thing 
as sin, willful violation of God's known laws springing 
from sinfulness in the human spirit. The Paraclete, the 
Holy Spirit will refute all such errors as teach that sin 
is a mere misfortune for which a man is to be pitied ; 
that sin is a mistake because it interferes with one's 
pleasures, and that whatever does not so interfere is not 
sin ; that sin is an inconvenience because it does not 
promote the greatest good of the greatest number, and 
that whatsoever would probably promote that good is 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 251 

not sin. He will blow away these fallacies. He will 
prove to each man that he is a sinner and that each sin 
is a black fact in his history. He will make manifest to 
the conscience the exceeding sinfulness of sin, its inde- 
scribable horribleness, the absolute necessity of quitting 
sin and being cured of sinfulness. Without the aid of 
the Holy Spirit no man can establish this proposition by 
any logical process. Nor, without the influence of the 
Holy Spirit, can any man show another that a failure to 
believe in Christ is sin, the sin, the consummate sin, 
parent of all other sins, is a willful violation of a known 
law of God, springing from the sinfulness of man's 
nature. Millions of us know it now, but in each case 
in which this conviction holds us it is the direct work of 
the Holy Ghost. 

It were a terrible thing to convict the world of sin 
and convince each man that he is a sinner and leave the 
matter there. The Holy Spirit does more. 

RIGHTEOUSNESS. 

2. The Paraclete establishes righteousness. He con- 
vinces men that there really is such a thing as righteous- 
ness, even as there is such a thing as sin ; that it is not 
a dream but a reality. And that convincing is a work 
which no man can do for himself or his fellow-man ; it 
can be produced in a human spirit only by some superior 
spirit. The ground of the conviction is the fact that 
Jesus Christ went from the cross and the grave back to 
discharge the functions of the Eternal God. Con- 
demned and killed and buried as a most unrighteous 
person, as a highly guilty person, His exaltation to be a 
Prince and a Saviour refutes the world's verdict and 



252 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

establishes the righteousness of Christ. When a man 
has a powerful and painful conviction of sin, he natu- 
rally looks toward God, remembering that his sin was a 
violation of the law of God. What is he to do in this 
case ? If the Holy Spirit left him with the mere con- 
viction that he was a sinner, he might give up the whole 
matter in despair ; if not that, he would set about keep- 
ing the known laws of God in the future. But still 
there would remain the facts of his sinful acts, unless 
also he had been convinced that a failure to believe in 
Jesus the Christ was his greatest sinfulness. The Holy 
Spirit convinces each man that neither despair nor self- 
righteousness will bring salvation, but that as sin is un- 
belief in Jesus, so faith in His Son is that righteousness 
which God recognizes. Both sin and righteousness have 
reference to Christ. 

JUDGMENT. 

3. So has judgment. Jesus Christ is the Judge. It 
is He who declares what is right and what is wrong ; it 
is He who declares who is guilty and who is innocent. 
He damns the devil, not the world. He had declared 
expressly that He had not been sent into the world to 
condemn [damn] the world, but that the world through 
Him might be saved (John iii., 17). Jesus knew that 
there was a personal devil. That settles it. What- 
ever men may conjecture, or surmise, or wish, the ex- 
istence of a personal devil is a fact in the universe. 
Jesus calls him "prince of this world, " the principal 
leader, commander, ruler of the forces of unbelief. He 
was the original apostle of unbelief. All who teach 
doubt are under his direction. Our Lord gives the 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 



253 



comprehensive designation of "this world" to all those 
who are not living a life of faith in Him. He had 
already said (John xii., 31) : " The prince of this world 
shall be cast out." "This world" is the world of all 
those who cherish disbelief. To be an unbeliever is to 
be the subject of Satan. " The prince of this world" is 
simply the "master of the infidels." It was he that 
brought Jesus to the cross. The power of the cross has 
proved the destruction of Satan, since all who have 
trusted in the atonement made on the cross have been 
able to break Satan's bonds and serve the Eighteous 
One : and no one else has. The point seems to be that 
as the chief and leading and most powerful of unbeliev- 
ers Satan has been judged and condemned and cast out 
by the cross. The whole world of his followers have 
fallen under the same judgment. The Holy Spirit will 
show the world that Jesus Christ is the Judge of all the 
judges of the earth. 

These three things the Holy Spirit was to do for "the 
world" in its relations to Jesus the Christ, and for 
eighteen centuries history has been showing the fulfill- 
ment of the promise. 



THE HOLY SPIRIT AND THE DISCIPLES. 

But their Master taught the disciples that the Holy 
Spirit would do much for them and their followers. 
He should develop Christianity. He is "the Spirit of 
the truth." Those who become the disciples of Christ 
He shall continue to convince of the heinousness of sin, 
inculcating righteousness in them, and warning them 
that every thing is to be judged now, hereafter, and 
forever, by its relation to the cross of Jesus Christ. 



254 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

He shall do more. He shall " guide them to the 
truth entire." "The truth" is what Jesus Christ 
taught for our salvation. It was promised that the 
Holy Spirit should bring all that to the disciples in its 
entirety ; and this was partly done when the Holy Spirit 
dictated the Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles ; and 
further, when in their preaching they set forth the 
death of Jesus as the free, full, and perfect oblation and 
sacrifice for the sins of the world, and His resurrection 
as the fact justifying the faith of believers. And still 
the Holy Spirit leads those who become Christ's disci- 
ples, spiritually guiding them away from all error of 
life and doctrine to the saving truth which Jesus has 
set forth. 

Certainly there is no promise here that the Holy 
Spirit should guide men into every hind of truth. 
Scientific truth must be sought by intellectual observ- 
ance of phenomena, by intellectual comparison and 
judgment, by intellectual processes of induction. Even 
here it has been found that spiritual help comes to all 
who devoutly study stone or star ; and many a scholar 
finds the deep truth of Luther's ordsse est studisse — 
prayer is study. It is a remarkable fact that all the 
men who have made the greatest contribution to our 
scientific knowledge, like Copernicus, Kepler, and New- 
ton, have been praying men, and have "thought the 
thoughts of God after Him/' under the guidance of the 
Holy Spirit. 

But the most valuable element in this promise is the 
assurance that if a man truly and sincerely desires to 
learn the truth for his salvation, he will be infallibly led 
thereto by the Holy Spirit. Plainly this could not be 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 255 

done by the continuance of Jesus Christ in the flesh, 
and herein we see how expedient it was that He should 
depart. The Holy Spirit does "not speak from Him- 
self," as Jesus the Christ said: that is, He does not 
speak independently of the Father, just as Jesus had said 
of Himself that the words He spake He spake not inde- 
pendently of the Father. (See chapter vii., 16-18; viii., 
26-28; xii., 49, 50.) There will be perfect unity be- 
tween the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. These 
three are one: so shall their teachings be. 

THE HOLY SPIRIT AND THE CHRIST. 

The third thing the Holy Spirit does is the glorifying 
of Christ. He does not glorify Himself, but He does 
glorify the Son. He brings no new truth, as the truth 
entire already exists. He simply takes the things of 
Christ and declares to the believer what they are. If 
any man profess to have a new, additional revelation, 
which differs from what Christ taught, he is deceived or 
he is an impostor if he set it forth as the product of the 
Holy Spirit. The revelation by the Holy Spirit is such 
a revelation as light makes. A whole library of richest 
books may be in a totally darkened room, and yet its 
very existence unknown; but let in the light, and then 
one not only sees the books, but sees how to read them. 
So the Holy Spirit shows us what is in Jesus the Christ. 

No man, however gifted, can do these things. Who- 
ever, therefore, brings any man under conviction of sin, 
of righteousness, of judgment, or gives him any saving 
view of Christ, does so by the Holy Ghost. He is the 
only Real Preacher in the world. Whoever is used by 
the Holy Spirit for this work is in the only succession of 



256 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

preachers acknowledged by the Holy Ghost, by the 
Only-Begotten Son, and by the Eternal Father. 

And these three are one, not three Gods, but one God, 
so interpenetrating each the others, so closely one that 
they can not even think apart, any more than the body, the 
soul, the spirit of any man can think or feel apart. The 
Son glorifies the Father, the Spirit glorifies the Son; the 
revelation of the Father is by the Son, the revelation of 
the Son is by the Holy Ghost. 

Is not this the Christ's thought of the Trinity as rep- 
resented to us by the Holy Spirit? 

And we are living under the dispensation of the Holy 
Spirit, and have a right to expect and claim for our- 
selves all that our Master has promised in behalf of the 
Paraclete, the Advocate, the Comforter of all His dis- 
ciples. 



XIX. 



W)t Utoine j&oliloqug. 



John XVII. 

(1) These things spake Jesus ; and lifting up His eyes to heaven, 
He said, ' ' Father, the hour is come ; glorify Thy Son, that the 
Son may glorify Thee : (2) even as Thou gavest Him authority 
over all flesh, that whatsoever Tfwu hast given Him, to them He 
should give eternal life. (3) And this is life eternal, that they should 
know Thee the only true God, and Him whom Thou didst send, even 
Jesus Christ. (4) / glorified Thee on the earth, having accom- 
plished the work which Thou hast given Me to do. (5) And now, 

Father, glorify Thou Me with Thine own self with the glory 
which I had with Thee before the world was. (6) i" manifested 
Thy name unto the men whom Thou gavest Me out of the world : 
Thine they were, and Thou gavest them to Me ; and they have 
kept Thy ivord. (7) Now they know that all things whatsoever 
Thou hast given Me are from Thee : (8) for the ivords which Thou 
gavest Me I have given unto them; and they received them, and 
knew of a truth that I came forth from Thee, and they believed 
that Thou didst send Me. (9) I make request for them : I make 
not request for the world, but for those whom Thou hast given Me ; 
for they are Thine : (10) and all things that are Mine are Thine, 
and Thine are Mine : and I am glorified in them. (11) And I am 
no more in the world, and these are in the world, and I come to 
Thee. Holy Father, keep them in Thy name which Thou hast 
given Me, that they may be one, even as we. (12) While I was 
with them, I kept them in Thy name which Thou hast given Me : 
and I guarded them, and not one of them perished, but the son of 
perdition ; that the Scripture might be fulfilled. (13) But now I 
come to Thee ; and these things I speak in the world, that they may 
have My joy fulfilled in themselves. (14) I have given them Thy 
word ; and the world hated them, because they are not of the world, 
even as I am not of the world. (15) I make not request that Thou 
shouldest take them out of the world, but that Thou shouldest keep 
them out of the evil one. (16) They are not of the world, even as I 
am not of the world. (17) Consecrate them in the truth : Thy word 
is truth. (18) As Thou didst send Me into the world, even so sent 

1 them into the world. (19) And for their sokes I consecrate My- 
self, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth." 



A DIVINE SOLILOQUY. 
THE CHRIST TALKING TO HIMSELF. 

THE night was growing on apace. Still in that 
upper chamber were Jesus and His disciples. 
Perhaps they had arisen in preparation for depart- 
ure into the open air. What a scene ! Eleven men 
stood gazing at a twelfth man, in whose countenance 
was the glow of the excitement of the speech He had just 
concluded, His farewell address to them, and it had 
ended in the triumphant note, " Be of good cheer; I 
have overcome the world/' 

Then He prays. If this be prayer, it shows that prayer 
is not always petition. Here it is almost altogether 
communion with God. And it is soliloquy. He is 
talking with Himself. Throughout His career we find 
frequent mention of His having prayed with His disci- 
ples; and He had taught them how to pray. This was 
His last prayer with them. He could not go out into the 
night — the night of the Gethsemane agony; the night of 
the base betrayal, the dreadful denial, the fearful flagella- 
tion; the night of the thorn-crown, the judgment; the 
night preceding the day of the crucifixion, the day in 
which He was to perform the high-priestly function of 
making a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, 
and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world, without 
a service of prayer. 

We may stand reverently near and listen; very rever- 



260 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

entry, because we are permitted to look into the heart 
of God, by hearing God commune with Himself. We 
should learn much. The prayer, taken as a whole, must 
impress us with the value of communing with the 
Father, even when there are no petitions to be pressed. 

FOR HIMSELF. 

First of all He prays for Himself. He said: " Father, 
the hour has come." For God, as well as for man, in 
the line of duration stand out certain hours which mark 
crises, beginnings which shall end every thing that has 
gone before. In the biography of God there was the 
" hour" of the creation of angelic existences, an hour 
which closed that previous eternity, in which the Father, 
Son, and Spirit had communion, for then other exist- 
ences began to be, and to share eternity with God. 
Another "hour" of God was when the corner-stone of 
the universe was laid, and the morning stars sang to- 
gether, and all the sons of God shouted for joy (Job 
xxxviii.). Another "hour" of God was when the Son, 
the Father's Fellow, emptied Himself of all glory, and 
took on Himself the form of a servant, and as a woman's 
babe was found in fashion as a man. Now another 
" hour" had come, in which He was to become obedient 
unto death, even the death of the cross (Phil. ii.). 

He prays that He Himself may be glorified. Twice, 
in divine tenderness, He says to the Father, " Tliy Son." 
" Glorify Thy Son." The prayer seems to involve 
asking for the exercise of some moral and spiritual 
power on the part of the Father, which should give the 
universe to see that the Son was really a glorious person, 
although His age and generation had rejected Him and 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 261 

hunted Him to death as a vile and noxious being, who 
should not be allowed to live among men. "Glorify" 
does not mean only to bestow glory, but, as here and else- 
where in Holy Scripture, to reveal glory. 

The reason He assigns is that He may "glorify" the 
Father, may still further make men drop their preju- 
dices and misconceptions of God, and learn from Jesus 
how holy, sweet, and lofty is the Father of the spirits of 
all flesh. 

WHAT HE HAD DONE. 

Then He states what He had done. It is important 
to notice that that is done in the second and fourth 
verses, which together make one sentence, being sepa- 
rate from the first verse and holding the third as a 
parenthesis. This is His statement of the definite motive 
which should bring the Son's glorification: "As Thou 
hast given Him authority over all mankind, in order 
that He might give eternal life to all them that Thou 
hast given Him, He has glorified Thee on the earth, hav- 
ing accomplished the work Thou hast given Him to do." 
"All flesh" is a phrase in the Old Testament and the 
New to signify all mankind. (See Genesis vi., 3, 12, 
and Acts ii., 17.) Jesus felt that He had been sent into 
the world by the grace of the Father, to offer the gift of 
"eternal life "to all mankind, and He had done so, 
showing in His life and teachings the glorious, all-com- 
prehending lovingness of God, and was about to finish 
His work, in "that He, by the grace of God, should (on 
the morrow) taste death for every man" (Hebrews ii., 9). 

The parenthesis enters after the use of the phrase 
"eternal life," which He had said that He had been 
sent to give to all mankind, and is a corrective of any 



262 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

misapprehension which might arise. What is this 
"life," this "aeonian life," which we call in our tongue 
" eternal life " ? Perhaps there has been a wide-spread 
mistake in regard to it. Perhaps it has generally im- 
plied to man's mind some relation of life with time. Is 
not that a mistake ? Is not the meaning deeper and 
better than that of mere immortality, simple deathless- 
ness ? We feel sure that it is. The Son says to the 
Father : "In this consists eternal life, that they should 
know Thee as the only true God, and Him whom Thou 
hast sent, the anointed Jesus." 

ETERNAL LIFE. 

This life, then, is subjective ; it is in the character of 
the person, and not in the condition of time. It is a 
peculiar kind of " life," " eternal," or " aeonian," 
namely, such as can be lived measurelessly in all ages, 
cycles, aeons. A life of any other character may be lived 
under the limitations of time and place, but a life of 
this kind can unfold itself any where and when. Mere 
animal life is not of that kind ; it .is manifestly secu- 
lar, which means having a time limit, depending on a 
physical organism, the disorganization of which closes 
the life. 

Now, how is that eternal life secured, that life of 
eternity ? By faithfully receiving and assimilating two 
truths, namely, that the Father is the one, the only, the 
true God, and so is Jesus the Christ, whom He hath 
anointed and sent to represent Him in the world. The 
human spirit which is so animated by this belief as to 
come into a real spiritual acquaintance with the Father 
and the Son can stand the wear and tear of all times 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 



203 



and all eternities. It does not comprehend this rela- 
tionship, just as it does not comprehend the relation- 
ship of itself to its consciousness of itself ; but it appre- 
hends it, and is satisfied to rest thereon. It thus 
receives into itself an indestructible germ which shall 
develop itself in the character and develop the character 
in all directions endlessly ; for such a spirit can never 
die. 

Having brought this great gift of the life of eternity 
into the world of time, and so brought more glory to 
God than He did when He created the worlds, He prays 
that the Father and the Son may be glorified together 
in the work in which They had been united, and that 
He may return to that glory which He and the Father 
had when They existed together, but alone in the uni- 
verse. How could He make it plainer that He believed 
Himself to be the Eternal God? Whatever does not 
bring glory to Jesus as God, brings Him no glory what- 
ever. For if He be not now and forever God, must He 
not have been a very wicked man or a very crazy man ? 
What fourth supposition is there ? 



FOR HIS DISCIPLES. 

Having prayed for Himself, Jesus now prays for His 
disciples, who stood about in the spirit of heaviness and 
the attitude of devotion. His words show that wonder- 
ful interplay of thought and feeling whereby His one- 
ness with the Eternal Father is wrought into hearts 
more than could be done by a mere dogmatic assertion. 
Thus He acknowledges His disciples as a gift from God 
the Father. They were the Father's, they are the Son's ; 
they are the Son's because they are the Father's ; what- 



264 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

ever is the Son's is the Father's. The most delicate 
suggestion of oneness, or consciousness of oneness, of 
possession, of volitions, of action, so that man may 
never give any glory to the Son which does not equally 
belong to the Father, nor assign to the Father any thing 
which does not belong to the Son. We must not sup- 
pose for a moment that the Son has done any thing for 
our redemption which has not been done by the Father. 
It were a dreadful theology, which should teach that the 
Son had wrested from the Father something the Father 
was unwilling to give, but which is indispensable for 
our salvation. The great work of the Son upon earth 
was to show the glory of the goodness of the Father. 

So the first thing He says in regard to them is, that 
He had manifested the Father's name to these disciples. 
The name of the Most High G-od was ineffable, and had 
never been pronounced by the ancestors of these disciples, 
the people who had the revelations of Himself, which God 
had thitherto chosen to give the world. They wrote 
four letters to stand for it, but they could not say for 
what they stood. They did not know His name. Jesus 
the Christ came into the world to pronounce that name : 
and it was "Fathek." He had shown them who and^ 
what God is, that He is "Our Father " — that " God is 
love " ; that God is such love as gives its only-begotten 
Son that its beloved human children should not perish 
but have eternal life. He had not simply told them 
this as a mere proposition ; He had "manifested," had 
shown, God in Himself, God in Christ reconciling the 
world unto Himself (2 Cor. v., 19). Jesus the Christ 
was the heart of God turned inside out that the world 
might see its love. For a season Jesus concentrated 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 265 

His whole sentimental being on these disciples, these 
"men/' to the exclusion of angels and all other men, 
these men who were of God's chosen people, and whom 
He had prepared to receive the Christ. And this seems 
the substance of the prayer. 

1. For their preservation. " Holy Father, keep 
through Thine own name those whom Thou hast given 
Me." Here He does not address the Father as "right- 
eous," as in vs. 25, but as " holy." Holiness is that 
lofty and tender lovingness of God which impels Him, 
who can not be touched by any defilement of evil or of 
sin, to lift His beloved out of the filth, and preserve 
them from the defilement of sin; the beauty of holiness 
is the condescension of its majesty. There can not be 
holiness without beauty and sweetness and helpfulness. 
(Read Isaiah xli., 14, and Psalms xxii., 4-7, and Isaiah 
vi., for the Old Testament idea of holiness.) As the 
prayer was for the preservation of the disciples by their 
representative, the Father is appropriately called "holy." 

It is not a blind petition that omnipotence might be 
exerted to put the disciples, as it were, in a fortified 
place for preservation. That could not be done. Om- 
nipotence can do only what can be done by power. 
Preservation in purity must be the result of some 
powerful internal influence which does not force the 
will. So the Lord said, "in Thy name," which makes 
the prayer signify that their preservation depends upon 
their remaining in that view of the nature and character 
of God which Jesus had revealed to them. Unless a 
man actually, thoroughly, and practically believes in 
God as Jesus revealed Him, he can not be kept from the 
evil that is in the world. Only truth is saving. 



266 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

2. So Christ's second prayer for the disciples was that 
they should be kept one, kept in the unity of the doc- 
trine of God which was revealed in Jesus, kept together 
by their trust in the teaching of Jesus that He was one 
with God, that all that belonged to God belonged to 
Him, and what was His was the Father's, who would 
care for it as His own, and that whoso had seen the 
Son had seen the Father, and therefore that the loving- 
ness of Jesus toward them in life and death was an 
exhibition of the love of God. He had kept them in 
this while He was in the world, and now that He was 
departing He committed them to the Father. 

3. But how small a benefit would an outward confes- 
sion of orthodoxy, or even a visible confraternity, be if 
no more were accomplished by discipleship for the disci- 
ples. He prays for their inner sanctification, a conse- 
cration of the truth they had received from Jesus and 
were then holding. This part of the prayer seems an 
anticipation, or even a prediction, of Pentecost. 

All these things might have happened if the disciples 
had been taken out of the world. But that was not the 
desire of the Master. The world greatly needed the 
men who held "the truth as it is in Jesus," and there- 
fore Christ very emphatically added, " I pray not that 
Thou shouldst take them out of the world." The lesson 
of this petition is that the highest thing which the Son 
could ask the Father to bestow upon the disciples was 
that which is adapted to practical life. Christians are 
to be in the world, but not of the world. Secluding 
one's self does not make one good. A man may be kept 
in solitary confinement, and live and die a criminal. 
Celibacy is a delusion, and solitude a snare. He that 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 267 

can not be holy in a crowd can not be holy in a closet. 
The dark places of the earth wherein dwells cruelty may 
be nunneries and monasteries, in some of which there 
have been more staining sins than in the salons of the 
cities and markets of the world. Christ held that it 
was more for the glory of the Father and the Son that 
the disciples should be kept from the evil than taken 
from the world. 

PRAYER FOR THE WORLD. 

Then follows His prayer for the world. He not only 
leaves His disciples in the world; He sends them out 
into the midst of all its dangers, that others might 
believe those things which He had taught them, espe- 
cially His Deity and His consecration to the work of 
saving them. He prays for their unity, certainly not in 
the sense in which it is often put forward, not in any 
ecclesiastical sense whatever, for no teacher was ever 
removed further from ecclesiasticism than our Lord. 
As the Father is God, and the Son is God, and the Par- 
aclete is God, and yet there is but one God, so He prays 
that all Christians might be one in all the characteristics, 
powers, and privileges of those whose life is hid with 
Christ in God. As there is no destruction of the per- 
sonality of the Father or of the Son in their oneness, so 
there is to be no suppression of personality of believers, 
no desire that there may be one visible organization, but 
an intense prayer that there may be preserved amongst 
them "the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace" 
(Eph. iv., 3), so that their lives might be hid with 
Christ in God (Col. iii., 3), Christ being the connecting 
link with the Father: " I in them and Thou in Me." 



268 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

The divine origin of Christianity finds its conclusive 
argument in the Christ-like life of Christians. 

The conclusion of the prayer includes Christ and His 
immediate disciples, and all subsequent believers, that 
they might be together in the glorified estate to which 
He was about to ascend. Nothing can be conceived 
more tender than this prayer. It expresses our Lord's 
intense desire that all who love Him should be with 
Him, as heaven could scarcely be heaven to the divine 
Bridegroom without the sanctified bride. He does not 
ask it as for something that may be granted or refused. 
He speaks to His Father as not merely to His equal, but 
as to His own self. " I will that they also may be with 
Me." The prayer of Jesus is the soliloquy of God. When 
speaking of the preservation and sanctification of the 
disciples He had used the word "holy," a word philo- 
sophically and theologically and biblically appropriate 
as referring to God's helpfulness. Now He says "right- 
eous Father," because it is simple justice that as on earth 
they had believed in His divinity, so in heaven they 
might have the reward of witnessing His glory He had 
had eternally, before He had made the worlds. 

THE PRAYER FULFILLED. 

And, so far as we can know or can see, up to this date 
the prayer of the Lord has been fulfilled. In the first 
place the apparent malefactor of eighteen centuries ago is 
the most glorious Person known in all history, is more 
revered and loved by more grand men and noble women 
and lovely children than any other man who has had a 
name among men. His disciples have had His prayer 
answered to them. Those who were about Him believed 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 269 

in His divinity, shaped their lives on that faith, taught 
that truth by tongue and pen, and transmitted it to 
their followers, so that they have formed "a commun- 
ion " of those whose fellowship has been with the Father 
and with the Son (1 John i.). 

So may we now believe that in eternity the remainder 
of the prayer will be fulfilled to all who are kept by 
Christ .in God's name (vs. 12), having received His words 
as God's words (vs. 6, 8), and having believed that what- 
ever belongs to God the Father belongs to God the Son, 
and having been sanctified in this truth (vs. 17) by God 
the Holy Spirit (xvi., 13). 

What a truth, what a fellowship, what a hope ! 



Fierce was the wild billow ; 

Dark was the night ; 
Oars labored heavily ; 

Foam glimmered white ; 
Mariners trembled ; 

Peril was nigh ; 
Then said the God of God, 

"Peace! It is I!" 

Ridge of the mountain-wave, 

Lower thy crest ! 
Wail of Euroclydon, 

Be thou at rest ! 
Peril can none be, 

Sorrow must fly, 
When saith the Light of light, 

"Peace! It is I!" 

Jesu, Deliverer! 

Come Thou to me ; 
Soothe Thou my voyaging 

Over life's sea! 
Thou, when the storm of death 

Roars, sweeping by, 
Whisper, Truth of truth! 
'Peace! It is I!" 

— St. Anatolius. 
{Translated by John Mason Neale, 1862.) 



XX. 
€ftristus Wmttuz. 






John XVIII. 

(1) When Jesus had spoken these words, He went forth with His 
disciples over the brook Kidron, where was a garden, into the which 
He entered, Himself and His disciples. (2) Now Judas also, which 
betrayed Him, knew the place: for Jesus ofttimes resorted thither 
with His disciples. (3) Judas then, having received the band of sol- 
diers, and officers from the chief priests and the Pharisees, cometh 
thither with lanterns and torches and weapons. (4) Jesus therefore, 
knowing all the things that were coming upon Him, went forth, and 
saith unto them, "Whom seek ye f" (5) They answered Him, 
(i Jesus the Nazarene." Jesus saith unto them, f 'I am He" And Judas 
also, which betrayed Him, was standing with them. (6) When there- 
fore He said unto them, "lam He," they went backward, and fell to 
the ground. (7) Again therefore He asked them, " Whom seek ye ? " 
And they said, "Jesus the Nazarene." (8) Jesus answered, "I told 
you that lam He: if therefore ye seek Me, let these go their way": 
(9) that the word might be fulfilled which He svake, "Of those wfwm 
Thou hast given Me Host not one." (10) Simon Peter therefore hav- 
ing a sword drew it, and struck the high-priest 's servant, and cut off 
his right ear. Now the servants name was Malchus. (11) Jesus there- 
fore said unto Peter, "Put up the sword into the sheath: the cup which 
the Father hath given Me, shall I not drink it? " (12) So the band 
and the chief captain, and the officers of the Jews, seized Jesus and 
bound Him, (13) and led Him to Annas first; for he was father-in- 
law to Caiaphas, which was high-priest that year. 






THE GREAT BETRAYAL. 
REMARKABLE LITERATURE. 

~TTT"HATEVER criticisms may be advanced on the 
VV Evangely as a whole, or on each Evangelist 
separately, or upon some isolated passages, it seems to 
me impossible that any man can read the first thirteen 
verses of the eighteenth chapter of John's gospel, together 
with the other incidents of the betrayal of Jesus, without 
feeling that here is a piece of composition in human 
language which quite surpasses all other things in human 
literature. 

These men are writing about their Master in the most 
critical juncture of His life, when He whom they loved 
above father and mother, and wife and child, and lands 
and church and country, whom at first they had considered 
a great teacher and subsequently had regarded as a won- 
derful prophet and then had fairly worshiped as divine, 
and now had been taught by Himself that He Himself is 
very God, was patiently submitting to the plans of cun- 
ning and the outrages of brutality. On what known 
laws of thought and feeling can we account for the fact 
that these men, naturally destitute of the literary art, 
living in the narrowest kind of life, should produce so 
statuesque a representation of a human god or god-man 
as to surpass all the productions of all the other poets, 
from Homer to Tennyson ? How can we account for 
their being able to do this without the betrayal of emo- 



274 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

tion, when men of the most masterful will and strongest 
passions have burst into tears or curses as they have read 
the story of the betrayal of Christ ? 

Let us, in this study, follow the line of John's narra- 
tive, bringing in the other incidents of the occasion as 
they are narrated by the other Evangelists. 

WITHDRAWAL TO GETHSEMANE. 

The prayer had closed in the upper chamber. It may 
be also that the sad company had sung another portion 
of the Great Hallel. Jesus had been accustomed to 
spend His nights out of the city, away from its tumult, 
probably at the house of His friends in Bethany. He 
must needs cross a valley down which in winter runs a 
stream called " Black Brook, " but which is dry in sum- 
mer. On the slope of Olivet, not far from the Kidron 
and the road to Bethany, was a garden called " The 
Garden of the Oil-Press" — Gethsemane — a name de- 
rived most probably from an oil-press belonging to the 
estate. It was a customary resort for Jesus and His 
disciples on their way to and from the city. Judas 
knew it. 

It must be noticed that twice in the first verse of this 
chapter the phrase "with His disciples" is used. It 
points to a characteristic of Jesus, namely, His total lack 
of mysteriousness and of those airs and tricks always 
ascribed to pseudo-prophets and reformers. All cabbala, 
incantations, and movements of prestidigitation ascribed 
to soothsayers and founders of false religions are totally 
wanting in the life of Jesus. He never went where His 
disciples might not go. " He went forth with His disci- 
ples"; "He and His disciples entered," 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 275 

Throughout the whole narrative of this tremendous 
transaction we notice how a tender regard for His disci- 
ples mingled with the most considerate prudence. He 
knew that Judas had gone to consummate his foul bar- 
gain with the wicked churchmen, who had no desire 
that Jesus should have a fair trial, but that He should 
be killed. Judas might at any time reappear accom- 
panied by the other conspirators, and if they attempted 
to seize Jesus in that private house within the city 
boundaries there might be acts of violence which would 
produce a riot and endanger the disciples. So He quietly 
withdrew the disciples to this garden. 

THE DIVINE AGONY. 

Upon entering the garden a great heaviness fell upon 
Him. He said to His disciples, " Sit down and pray that 
you do not enter into temptation, while I go and pray 
yonder/' He took with Him Peter and James and John, 
As they walked toward a more sheltered part of the 
garden, He began to show signs of terror and distress, 
so much so that His three friends probably spoke about 
it ; and this led Him to say : " My soul is exceedingly 
sorrowful even unto death : remain here and watch with 
Me." It was the vernal equinox, near midnight, and 
the moon, being two days from its full, would render 
objects visible in the cleared portions of the garden. As 
His mental anguish deepened, Jesus went into the 
deeper gloom of the garden, among the thicker growth 
of trees. There He kneeled down and fell on His face 
and prayed: "0 My Father, if it be possible let this 
cup pass from Me: yet not as I will, but as Thou wilt." 
How long He thus agonized we can not know. The 



276 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

three disciples probably heard Him at the beginning; at 
least John heard this much of the prayer and has 
reported it. The august Sufferer also must have had 
some comfort from this communion with the Father, 
for after some time He returned to the three disciples 
and found them all asleep. The travel and excitement 
of the day had proved too much for them. They cer- 
tainly did not comprehend the crisis which had come 
in the affairs of Jesus. He addressed Peter with the in- 
tensely pathetic appeal, " What, could you not watch 
with Me one hour ? Bise, watch and pray, that you do 
not enter into temptation." Then, with compassionate 
thought of their human weaknesses, saying, " The spirit 
indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak," He left His 
poor, heavy-eyed, and exhausted friends, and wont back 
and prayed, saying, " My Father, if this may not 
pass away except I drink it, Thy will be done." 

He came the second time to His disciples and found 
them all asleep. Down on His soul fell a great horror 
of desertion. It was past the midnight. Over the hill 
in Bethany, Lazarus and Martha and Mary, and perhaps 
His own mother, for she was at the feast, were sleeping. 
In front lay Jerusalem, the moon sailing on above and 
beyond the city, whose walls on this side grew darker 
from top to bottom ; and within those walls they were 
plotting to destroy Him without fair trial. Judas had left 
Him on an errand that was to be disastrous. Here lay 
Peter, James, and John, asleep, near His scene of un- 
speakable anguish. There lay the other eight, asleep 
also. His country was under the Roman, whose garrison 
filled yonder tower of Antonia. The Church was 
arrayed against Him. His mother was away^ and so was 



THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL IXSIGHT. 217 

Mary Magdalen, His sweet, pure, true friend. He was 
alone. 

He staggered back and fell upon the ground, and the 
third time He prayed this prayer of exquisite pain and 
perfect submission. The horror of His position lay 
heavy on Him. In His agony He prayed more earnestly ; 
and His sweat was as it were clots of blood falling down 
to the ground, a phenomenon not confined to this case, 
the writer of these pages having known an instance. An 
angel appeared to Him and gave Him succor. In it all 
His godlike majesty never forsook Him. Now His human 
weakness was strengthened, and His serenity in some 
measure restored. Approaching His disciples, He said 
to them, " Sleep on now and rest." Afterward He sud- 
denly said, " It is enough. Behold, the hour is here, 
and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sin- 
ners. Rise; let us go. See, he that betrays Me is here! " 
And while He was speaking these words, Judas, who 
knew the place, and knew that it was a resort of Jesus 
and of His disciples, probably having sought Him in 
vain in the chamber where he had left Him, came upon 
the party. He was accompanied by a band of men 
whom he had received from the chief priests and Phari- 
sees. They were not all Roman soldiers, but some were 
servants of the priests and some were members of the 
Sanhedrim. They had no official authority to do as they 
did. They were the minions of the Church party, who 
had united with the Roman soldiery to perpetrate this law- 
less outrage. 

THE TREACHEROUS KISS. 

It seems to have been prearranged that Judas was 
not to take any part in acts of violence toward Jesus, 



278 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

but was simply to designate Him by a kiss. Probably 
this was the usual salutation which the disciples gave 
their Lord upon meeting. So Judas approached Jesus 
and kissed Him and said, in a tone which could be heard 
by the band, " Hail, Eabbi! " When he did so the sim- 
ple majestic utterance of Jesus was, " Comrade, for 
what are you here ? Do you betray the Son of Man 
with a kiss ? " It is to be noticed that Jesus did not 
use a word of endearment in calling Judas "Friend/' 
when the traitor gave the kiss of betrayal. While it 
was not an unfriendly salutation, the word employed was 
not one of affection. It was merely the courteous word 
which a well-bred person uses, more from self-respect 
than from approval of the person addressed; as a gentle- 
man of these days might begin his letter to a man whom 
he despised by the ordinary opening phrase of " Dear 
sir." So in Matt, xxii., 12, "Friend, how earnest 
thou in hither not having the wedding garment ? " So 
also in Matt, xx., 13, where the employer says to the 
discontented laborer, "Friend, I do thee no wrong." 
The same word is used in all these passages. The ques- 
tions of Jesus to Judas manifestly were not intended to 
solicit information, but to stir his conscience. 

Jesus knew that all things were now coming upon 
Him, that His hour had arrived. He would neither 
hasten nor retard it. He advanced to the torch-bearing 
and armed company, and said, "Whom seek ye?" 
This movement shows that His death was voluntary, a 
point always to be kept in view; for if, without His own 
surrender, His life could have been taken, the whole 
mission of Jesus had been a failure and His claims be- 
come a nullity. To His question they replied, "Jesus 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 279 

the Nazarene." It is to be noticed that ' ' the Nazarene," 
not " of Nazareth," was the form the title took when 
it was desired to be specially contemptuous. But, un- 
doubtedly, the designation of the place was intended to 
prejudice His case, as indicating that He came from 
that particularly turbulent town in turbulent Galilee. 
His reply is significant. In telling them that He was 
the person they sought He announced the name of Jeho- 
vah, " I am." It must have struck the Hebrews in the 
crowd ; perhaps it intensified their hatred and their 
zeal for His destruction, as He gave Himself the name 
of the Most High God. And John stops to record 
that " Judas was standing with them." He was not 
standing with the party of loyal disciples ; he was not 
standing with Jesus ; he was standing with them ! He 
was going to his own place. 

THE DIVINE SELF-CONTROL. 

What there was of majesty, innocence, and spiritual 
power in His presence and reply we may conjecture from 
the fact that though they were all armed, and were 
many, coming out against a man whose friends were 
few and unprepared for conflict, they staggered back- 
wards and fell to the ground. Here was a Person capable 
of inspiring such awe, and yet never voluntarily, so far 
as we can perceive, putting forth any influence to serve 
or save Himself. He stood alone in that garden in the 
broad light of the full paschal moon, and the band of 
conspirators and ruffians who had come to take Him lay 
prone on the ground. He recalls them by asking a 
second time, "Whom seek ye?" And they made the 
same reply as before, "Jesus the Nazarene." He said 



280 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

to them, "I have told you that I am He ; if, therefore, 
you seek Me, let these go away," so that His disciples 
might not suffer with Him. It would seem as if He had 
exerted His power over His enemies that His disciples, 
seeing it, might take heart enough at least to escape to a 
place of safety. 

So, when the minions gathered courage to advance 
upon Jesus, the disciples had courage to resist, and said, 
"Lord, shall we smite with the sword ?" The impet- 
uous Peter did not wait for reply, but immediately made 
a blow at the nearest man, who happened to be one 
Malchus, a slave of the high-priest, and cut off his right 
ear. The fact that Peter was not arrested, either at this 
moment or afterwards, when he was recognized by a 
relative of Malchus at the house of the high-priest, 
seems proof that this was an illegal seizure, otherwise 
Peter's resistance would have been '/an act of rebellion 
by an armed force against a judicial order." Jesus 
healed the priest's servant with a touch. It was His 
latest miracle, a miracle of tenderness toward one who 
was a slave, and who was assisting to murder Him. 
And yet that did not soothe the rancor of His foes ! 
But it was Godlike! 

He also restrained His disciples, who, under the awe 
which the presence of Jesus inspired in His persecutors, 
might have perhaps delivered Him. He said to Peter, 
" Return your sword into its place; for all who take the 
sword shall perish by the sword. Do you not think that 
I am able to pray unto My Father, and He shall forth- 
with give Me more than twelve legions of angels ? But 
how then should the Scriptures be fulfilled, that thus it 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 281 

must be ? The cup which My Father has given Me, 
shall I not drink it ? " 

He did not, however, forbear to let the multitude 
understand that He knew the illegality of what they 
were doing. "Have ye come out as against a thief, 
with swords and clubs, to take Me ? I sat daily teach- 
ing in the Temple, and ye laid no hold upon Me. But 
this is the hour, and the power of darkness. All this 
has come to pass that the writings of the prophets might 
be fulfilled." It was a distinct intimation to the mob 
that He was suffering voluntarily, and quite as distinct 
an intimation to His disciples that He was going to 
suffer certainly. So they understood it, and forsook 
Him and fled. 

Then "the officers of the Jews took Jesus and bound 
Him." They bound HIM ! Never before nor since 
have men and angels seen a sight like that. There He 
stood meekly, He whom, with the Father, the angels 
had been accustomed to worship " before the world was"; 
He by whom the heavens and the earth had been made; 
He who had all power in heaven and upon earth, which 
He could have swept away at a breath — He stood and, 
for love's sake, permitted omnipotence to be bound. 
Such a picture of God no other painters have been able 
to draw. Beside the Christus Vinctus of the Evangely, 
how feeble is the Prometheus Vinctus of iEschylus ! 

Jesus could have been legally arrested only by the 
Roman authorities. These people had no right to take 
Him, alone, unarmed, unresisting. But if they had 
had authority they should have taken Him to a Roman 
tribunal, instead of which they took Him to a private 






282 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

house, the house of a bitter old churchman, who was 
prominent in the church party who compassed the 
slaughter of Jesus. 

There began the extra-legal, unjust, outrageous pros- 
ecution of Jesus, which ended in the death of the 
sweetest, strongest, manliest, divinest Man that ever 
trod the earth, who perished as a malefactor, without 
any legal trial whatever. 

We have not space to examine the ecclesiastical trial 
of Jesus before the high-priest. It was an extra-legal 
outrage, as most church trials have been. The author 
ventures to refer the reader to his " The Light of the 
Nations/' pp. 636-644, for an examination of the eccle- 
siastical proceedings in this case. We must pass to His 
civil trial, mainly taken from that book. 



XXI. 

STije ffifjrat Suffering untier Pontius pilate ; 
or, &f)e ©toil Srtal of Jesus. 






John XIX. 

(1) Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged Him. (2) And 
the soldiers plaited a crown of thorns, and put it on His head, and 
arrayed Him in a garment ; and they came unto Him, (3) and said, 
" Hail, King of the Jews / " and they struck Him with their hands. 
(4) And Pilate went out again, and saith unto them, "Behold, I 
bring Him out to you, that ye may know that I find no crime in 
Him." (5) Jesus therefore came out, wearing the crown of thorns 
and the purple garment. And Pilate saith unto them, " Behold 
the man!" (6) When therefore the chief priests and the officers 
saw Him, they cried out, saying, " Crucify Him, crucify Him." 
Pilate saith unto them, " Take Him yourselves, and crucify Him : 
for I find no crime in Him." (7) The Jews answered him, "We 
have a law, and by that law He ought to die, because He made Him- 
self the Son of God." (8) When Pilate therefore heard this saying, 
he was the more afraid; (9) and he entered into the palace again, 
and saith unto Jesus, " Whence art Thou f " But Jesus gave him 
no answer. (10) Pilate therefore saith unto Him, " Speakest Thou 
not unto me ? Knowest Thou not that I home power to release Thee, 
and have power to crucify Thee?" (11) Jesus answered him, 
" Thou wouldst have no power against Me, except it were given thee 
from above : therefore he that delivered Me unto thee hath greater 
sin." (12) Upon this Pilate sought to release Him: but the Jews 
cried out, saying, " If thou release this man, thou art not Casar's 
friend : every one that maketh himself a king speaketh against 
Gwsar." (13) When Pilate therefore heard these words, he brought 
Jesus out, and sat down on the judgment-seat at a place called the 
Pavement, but in Hebrew, Gabbatha. (14) Now it was the prepara- 
tion of the passover : it was about the sixth hour. And he saith unto 
the Jews, "Behold your King!" (15) They therefore cried out, 
"Away with Him, away with Him, crucify Him." Pilate saith 
unto them, "Shall I crucify your King?" The chief priests 
answered, "We have no king but Omar." (16) Then therefore he 
delivered Him unto them to be crucified. 



UNDER PONTIUS PILATE. 

THE CIVIL TRIAL OF JESUS. 

PALESTINE was a conquered province, regularly 
governed by the conquerors. A special procura- 
tor was appointed for Judea, and the office at this time 
was held by Pontius Pilate. The procurator ordinarily 
resided at Caesarea, by the seaside, but usually came up 
with troops to attend the great festivals, partly for the 
enjoyment he might have amid the excitements, and 
partly because it was his duty to keep the Eoman 
authority before the eyes of the Jews, and to be ready 
to repress any popular outbreak which would be likely 
to occur when so many people were assembled at the 
metropolis. During the six years in which he had held 
the office Pilate had incensed the Jews by his violence 
and oppression. 

The Sanhedrim had no right to inflict capital punish- 
ment. Wherever Rome extended its dominion the jus 
gladii, the right of the sword, the power over life and 
death, was taken from the conquered. In the case of 
the Jews all minor matters were left in the hands of 
their Council, especially the settlement of all religious 
questions, but civil cases were tried by the procurator, 
and capital cases by the Praeses. In this case it seems to 
have been deputed to the procurator. He was present 
in the city. It was the beginning of Friday. The 
Sabbath was to commence on the evening of that day. 
They had only that morning to secure the condemnation 



286 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

and execution of Jesus. If delayed until the festival 
had passed, the whole country might be aroused, and a 
great reaction in His favor might set in. It was there- 
fore determined to keep Him bound and guarded, and 
to assemble at daybreak and push their plans to con- 
summation. 

All the night long was Jesus buffeted, tortured, 
insulted. They would have killed Him if they had 
dared; but Home looked down on them from the 
tower of Antonia and kept even churchly rage in check. 
Day began to dawn. The light was breaking over Olivet. 
The earliest movements must be made. The procurator 
must be seen as early as practicable. There was a re- 
assembling of the Sanhedrim. In the night session they 
had condemned Him: but beyond that they were power- 
less; they could not execute Him, and they could not 
see Pilate at that hour. 

The object of the morning meeting was to concoct 
plans to have Him put to death, according to their 
verdict. This could be done only through Pilate. They 
prearranged their methods. They took Jesus bound, 
making as imposing a procession as possible; thus, as far 
as in them lay, prejudicing His case. The palace of 
Pilate had been desecrated in their eyes by having been 
the residence of a Gentile. These scrupulous officials, 
intent on a crime, compassing the destr action of a Man 
against whom they could prove nothing, although He 
had led a public life by the space of three years, were so 
cautious that they would not defile themselves by enter- 
ing a Gentile's house ! They forgot that the members 
of the Sanhedrim were bound to spend the day fasting 
in which they had condemned a man to death. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 287 

They sent in to Pilate, and he came out, as his cus- 
tom was. Then commenced a play of passions on both 
sides, which constitutes a profoundly interesting study. 
He saw the crowd, the Council, the Prisoner. It was 
an unusual hour. It must be an unusual case. His quick 
eye interpreted the general meaning of the scene. Turn- 
ing to Caiaphas and the Sanhedrim, he said, " What 
accusation do you bring against this Man ? " 

It is not mere fancy, it is an exercise in insight, to 
strive to know what looks and gestures accompanied 
any speech of any historical character. It is well known 
how greatly these vary the sense of the mere words. If 
we could know precisely the motions of the person, the 
play of the lips, the glance of the eye of Jesus, how 
much more intelligible would His words be, and how 
our interpretation of them might be changed. And 
still more how we should be helped by a knowledge of 
the precise tone and emphasis He employed. The same 
is true of others, and here of Pilate. He may have 
looked at Jesus and seen Him pale and worn, yet calm 
as the morning in whose light He stood. He may have 
contrasted the face of the Prisoner, so free from passion, 
with the heated and fierce glare in the countenances of 
Caiaphas and the Sanhedrim, whose excitement and 
anger through the night must have left their traces ; 
and Pilate may have uttered unfeigned surprise by the 
exclamatory question, " What accusation do you bring 
against Him?" as if intimating that if either party 
should be plaintiff: it was Jesus. 

Eead with any emphasis, the question gave the 
churchmen plainly to understand that in this case Pilate 
did not intend to pronounce perfunctorily a confirma- 



288 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

tion of any sentence they may have passed, ordering its 
execution without examination. Unfortunately for him 
he had in haste done such things before, and thus em- 
boldened these men to venture in this case a presump- 
tion upon his judicial carelessness. He gave them to 
understand that he intended to take cognizance of this 
case. His question assumed, what the Sanhedrim knew 
to be true, that he had the right of original jurisdiction, 
as representative of the Roman emperor. This took 
them aback. They had not expected from Pilate such 
assertion of his rights. They expected of him simply 
the secular sanction to their ecclesiastical verdict. But 
Pilate took the bench, and put them on the stand of 
witnesses. 

This touched their pride to the quick, while it seemed 
to intimate a miscarriage of their whole plan. Their 
arrogant reply was, " If He were not a malefactor we 
would not have delivered Him up to you." As if they 
resented the insult which was implied in his words, that 
they could have condemned an innocent man. But 
Pilate was as proud as Caiaphas. In reply to their 
claim to be judges, he said to the Jews, "Take Him, 
and judge Him according to your law." As if he had 
ironically said, " Oh, that is it ! You do not vouchsafe 
to inform me even of the accusation against this man. 
You claim to be judges. You know your limit. I am sure 
that I am willing that you should try Him according to 
your law, and condemn Him, and punish Him as far as 
the law will permit. If you be judges, take the case away, 
and do not trouble me with it." This irony was stinging; 
but the Roman might become obstinate, and insist that 
the case remain with them, and they could not put 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 289 

Jesus to death ; and so the whole scheme was like to 
miscarry. 

This brought them to terms. They were obliged to 
submit the indictment. If they had had all power in 
their hands they would have stoned Him for blasphemy. 
It is noticeable that Jesus had predicted that His career 
would end in crucifixion, the Eoman — rather than in 
stoning, the Hebrew — mode of execution. The proba- 
bilities had all been in favor of the latter. It was this 
sudden and unexpected obstinacy of Pilate which 
changed the current of affairs. For a moment' they 
were in perplexity. To tell Pilate that Jesus had com- 
mitted blasphemy, by claiming to be God's equal, would 
go for nothing. He had no interest in their religious 
questions : he was utterly a pagan. They changed 
their ground, and said, " We found this one perverting 
our nation, and forbidding to give tribute to Caesar, 
saying that He Himself is Christ, a king/' There are 
three counts in this allegation ; the first two being to 
the nation notoriously false, and the third being to 
Pilate merely ridiculous. Jesus had explicitly taught 
the people to i( render unto Caesar the things that are 
Caesar's " ; but the bare fact that such a question should 
have been brought to him is an indication of the unset- 
tled state of the public mind, and how ready the people 
were to listen to any suggestions of rebellion. Caiaphas 
and his fellow-conspirators knew that, in the sense in 
which Pilate must have understood it, the third count 
was false. Jesus had aspired to no temporal rule, and 
had done nothing to make Himself a rival of Caesar, 
but had simply claimed to be the Messiah, a claim 
in which the representative of the Eoman emperor 



290 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

could have no official, and scarcely any personal, 
interest. 

But as the allegation had been made, the investiga- 
tion must be had. Pilate went into the praetorium, so 
as to take his official position. The Eoman trial was 
public. Any could enter. Jesus had no scruples, and 
when He was called went in at once. There were the 
representatives of the scrupulous churchmen present. 
If they could not go in, they could send in those who 
should watch and in some measure influence proceed- 
ings. Friends of Jesus might also enter and report to 
those outside. 

Pilate said to Jesus, " Are you the King of the 
Jews ? " Whether Pilate intended it or not, there was 
a trap in the question. It could not have a categorical 
answer. If Jesus said " Yes/' to Pilate's manner of 
thought it might seem an acknowledgment of the 
charge of sedition they were making against Him. If 
He said ' ' No/' it would seem an abandonment of the 
Messianic claims He had already advanced. His reply 
to Pilate was a question: "Do you say this of yourself, 
or did others tell it you of Me ?" To a man of the 
world like Pilate it should have shown that the person 
before him was not a crazy adventurer from the rural 
districts, whose claim to be Tiberius himself, if He had 
made it, would have been as harmless as any other 
utterance of wild insanity. It meant, "Do you put 
that question to Me in the Roman or the Jewish, in the 
political or the ecclesiastical, sense ?" " Am I a Jew ?" 
Pilate replied rather petulantly. " Your own nation 
and the high-priest have delivered You to me. What 
have You done ? " 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 291 

But now He can approach an answer to Pilate which 
shall be consistent at once with His innocence and His 
claims. He said, " My kingdom is not of this world. 
If My kingdom were of this world, then would My ser- 
vants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews. 
My kingdom is not from hence." Here was a statement 
which implied that there was a kingdom whose defend- 
ers were not the Eoman eagles. To an imperial official 
there seemed no kingdom that was not Eoman. Or, if 
any other kingdom, it would draw sword but in vain, 
for it should soon succumb to Roman power. But the 
kingdom of Jesus was totally disengaged from secular 
governments, reigning under and over and through 
them, and would survive them, and did not need the 
defense of the sword. But a kingdom implied a king, 
and yet such a kingdom as Jesus had been describing 
seemed a mere vague idea ; so Pilate asked, "Are you 
not a king, then ? " 

Now, Jesus had placed His judge in such a posture 
that the answer about to be given should not be decep- 
tive : " Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end 
was I born, and for this purpose came I into the world, 
that I should bear witness concerning the truth. Every 
one who is of the truth hears My voice." It was the 
kingdom of truth, and not of physical power, in which 
He claimed to be supreme. Such a claim threatened 
no danger to the emperor : why, then, should Pilate 
care for it ? He had heard such things before. There 
were Greek and Roman philosophers who taught that 
those who lived by the truth were kings among men. 
And it seemed to Pilate that it was the same proposition 
he had heard often, now pronounced by a Jew. He did 



292 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

not believe that men could reach the ultimate and abso- 
lute truth. It was a pretty fancy for poetic dreamers, a 
fine theory for recluses and philosophers, but there was 
nothing practical in it, nor useful to a man of affairs. 
It may have been with some bitterness of regret that 
such a search should be, as he believed, fruitless, that 
Pilate exclaimed with a sigh, " What is truth ? " as he 
passed out to the portico to announce the acquittal of 
Jesus to the priests, which he did by saying, "I find 
no fault in Him." 

Then the vehement Sanhedrim repeated their accusa- 
tions. Jesus said not a word. The contrast between 
the raging churchmen and the meek heretic struck 
Pilate so forcibly that he appealed to Him : "Do You 
answer nothing? See how many things they witness 
against You." Jesus kept His silence. In the ecclesi- 
astical and in the civil courts Jesus paid no attention to 
any thing that did not touch His claims to Messiahship. 
When that was involved He was perfectly explicit, 
giving His persecutors and His judges ample ground. 
On all else He was silent. He would perish in His claim 
to be the Son of God in a sense signifying that He was 
God's Equal. This self-control seemed marvelous to 
Pilate, who reiterated his judgment, saying, "I find 
no fault in this Man." But the crowd about the portico 
was fierce. However innocent Jesus might be, He had 
manifestly rendered Himself odious to the ecclesiastical 
rulers. It placed Pilate in a trying position. For all 
that appeared, he should have set Jesus free ; but to do 
so peremptorily, before he had allayed the passionate 
excitement of the church party, would be to peril all 



THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL IHSIGHT. 293 

parties. His parley with the priests was in the interests 
of Jesus and justice. 

But the rabid mob shouted : " He stirs up the mul- 
titude throughout all Judaea, even beginning from 
Galilee to this place." Here was a distinct charge of 
sedition ; but the naming of Galilee was an outlet for 
the perplexed Pilate. They mentioned it as a sinister 
circumstance that this Man's ministry had begun among 
the turbulent Galilaeans, in a country belonging to 
Herod, his political adversary. The shrewd Pilate saw 
in it a solution of his difficulty. 

There had come a cloud between Herod and Pilate. 
Some of the turbulent subjects of the former had visited 
Jerusalem on a festival occasion, and created an insur- 
rection which Pilate had suppressed by indiscriminate 
slaughter, not stopping to send them for trial to the 
courts in the dominion of Herod. This had made an 
estrangement between the rulers. Now the Galilaean 
king had come up to Jerusalem to celebrate the Pass- 
over. It would be a graceful recognition of Herod's 
jurisdiction, and a compliment, to send this distin- 
guished Prisoner to him for trial, and it would free 
Pilate from further proceedings. Therefore he sent 
Him to Herod. It did heal the quarrel ; but it did not 
relieve Pilate of the case. 

When the frivolous Herod saw Jesus he was glad. 
There was not manliness enough in him to see that this 
was a most perplexing affair, in which the empire, his 
own tetrarchy, the weal of the Jewish people, and the 
interests of his ancestral religion, as well as the fate of 
a great and good man, might be involved. It was an 



294 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 

opportunity to have an exhibition of legerdemain or 
necromancy, and this incestuous assassin had no such 
weight on his seared conscience that he could not enjoy 
any species of entertainment. He catechized Jesus in 
many ways, endeavoring to draw Him at least into con- 
versation. Jesus looked at him with that broad look 
which innocent manliness gives to a criminal. He 
could have spoken what would have riven Herod, but 
He was silent. The church party stood near, and were 
vehement and violent in their accusations ; but not a 
word could be extorted from Jesus. He had never 
before met any man or woman or child to whom He 
would not speak. There never was a sinner so great 
that, with any expression of contrition, could not 
have a word from Jesus. But Herod lived and died, 
probably the only man who, having seen Jesus, never 
heard the tones of His voice nor a syllable from His lips. 
Back to Pilate is Jesus now sent. We do not know 
whether Pilate was in the tower of Antonia, and Herod 
occupying the palace of his father, which is said to have 
exceeded the Temple in splendor, but in any case the 
distance was not great. The troubled procurator dis- 
covered that he had appeased Herod, but had not shifted 
the responsibility of this most perplexing case. When 
he saw Jesus brought back, wearing a robe of mockery, 
it plainly confirmed his suspicion that the accused was 
innocent. The greater part of His public life had been 
passed in the territory of Herod, who must have known 
the fact if Jesus had been a seditious person. His 
treatment of the prisoner plainly said that Herod 
regarded His kingly pretension as a harmless vagary, 
not fit to be treated seriously by any nil or. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 295 

Then Pilate called the Sanhedrim to him and ad- 
dressed them thus: "You have brought this Man to me 
as one who perverts the people, a revolutionary dema- 
gogue. And see, I have examined Him in your pres- 
ence, and. have found no fault in this Man touching 
those things whereof you accuse Him. Neither did 
Herod, for he sent Him to us; and see, nothing deserv- 
ing of death has been found in Him. I will scourge and 
release Him." Pilate, it would seem, had no feelings of 
malignity against Jesus. He was really desirous of 
releasing Him, while desirous at the same time of pleas- 
ing the Sanhedrim as far as practicable. He appeals to 
the fact that he had taken cognizance of the case; had 
heard the indictment; had openly conducted the trial 
in their presence, so that they could put in any proofs 
they thought likely to convict, and he had been 
willing to convict, and had shown his willingness by 
sending the prisoner to Herod, a native prince and a 
co-religionist of theirs, as the ruler in whose jurisdiction 
the most of the life of Jesus had been spent, and where, 
as they had alleged, Jesus had stirred up the people. 
No proof of seditious behavior had appeared. This Man 
might be a wild enthusiast, but He was not a dangerous 
revolutionist. He should therefore scourge Him and 
release Him. 

In the meantime the ecclesiastical party were busy 
with the multitude, inciting them to violent demonstra- 
tion. They had been telling the people that Jesus had 
blasphemed before the Sandedrim, the High Council of 
the nation, claiming to be Jehovah. It is always to be 
remembered that the people expected the Messiah to be 
;i man, and not a God, not even an angel, certainly not 



296 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

Jehovah. Blasphemy was the supreme crime in their 
code of ethics. It was because Jesus was a good man, 
such a very good man, and exercised such great moral 
power, that they regarded Him as about to be their Mes- 
siah. If, however, He had blasphemed in the presence 
of the elders of His people, He could be nothing to them 
but a deceiver. The passions of the mob were adroitly 
plied by these wily and bitter ecclesiastics, and they 
were prepared to show an outbreak of passionate reac- 
tionary feeling against Jesus. 

Pilate does not seem to have calculated on this state 
of affairs when he resolved to appeal from the clergy to 
the laity, from the priests to the people. He must have 
known something of the personal popularity of the 
young Prophet, and hoped to be able to array the people 
against their rulers. For that purpose, apparently, he 
gathered them together, and when Pilate came before 
the mob they broke into the demand that he should 
comply with the custom which gave them any prisoner 
they might demand, no matter what his crime. It 
seems to have flashed upon Pilate as a bright idea. He 
could now turn this demand to the account of Jesus. 
He agreed that it was the custom, and that he was 
prepared to observe it, and then, that they might come 
to his aid against the priests, he fell upon another expe- 
dient. There lay in the prison at that moment a man 
named Barabbas, whose general notoriety as a robber had 
culminated in an act of sedition in the very metropolis, 
in which outbreak it was well known that he had com- 
mitted murder. He had been tried and convicted for 
the very crime which had been charged on Jesus, 
namely, sedition. No one doubted the guilt of Barab- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 297 

bas, while no one could bring a particle of proof 
to fasten the charge on Jesus. The contrast was 
striking. Agreeing to observe the custom, he narrows 
the choice to a selection between Jesus and Barabbas, 
not having apparently the shadow of a doubt that the 
popular voice would at once release Jesus from His peril 
and Pilate from his perplexity. 

To his utter astonishment the people preferred Ba- 
rabbas. 

Pilate could scarcely persuade himself that the people 
had made this choice. He was not much of a democrat. 
He could not have believed that most monstrous false- 
hood, Vox popuU vox Dei est. But a few days before, the 
multitude had come trooping into Jerusalem, shouting 
paeans to this extraordinarily popular Prophet. They 
certainly could not now prefer Barabbas to Him, for 
Barabbas had made the highway dangerous and had been 
a common villain. Moreover, he had been condemned 
for that of which their leaders had accused Jesus. It is 
this which had made Pilate all along suspicious of the 
churchmen : they preferred a political charge § against 
Jesus, while he knew that in their hearts they did not 
love the Roman yoke. But Pilate was giving way. He 
had already agreed to scourge an innocent man. They 
pushed him. They cried out "all at once." It was 
the roar of what Burke calls the Bellua Populus, that 
wild beast the People. It was becoming frightful. 
" Not this man ! " " Away with this fellow f " " Release 
Barabbas to us ! " What is the governor to do in this 
case ? Jesus is charged with sedition, and the Jews are 
proving their loyalty to Rome by urging His destruction; 
but they are proving their disloyalty by demanding the 



298 THE GOSPEL OE SPIKITUAL IXStGHT. 

release of a man convicted of leading a seditious insur- 
rection. 

Standing on his judgment-seat, Pilate demanded : 
' { What shall I do, then, with Jesus, who is called Christ, 
whom ye call King of the Jews ? " " Crucify Him, cru- 
cify Him ! " they exclaimed. A third time the governor 
interposed : " What evil has He done ? Prove a capital 
crime. I have found no cause of death in Him. I will 
release Him, after having scourged Him. " But that prop- 
osition did not pacify them. They cried out the more 
exceedingly, saying, with loud voices, " Let Him be 
crucified ! " When the populace united with the priests 
Pilate gave way. He had shown a weakness of which 
the priests, who hated him, took advantage. Perhaps 
he reasoned thus : Things have reached such a pass that 
quiet can no more be restored without bloodshed. To 
release Jesus will not save Him from this furious mob, 
who will tear Him in pieces. An insurrection will be 
raised. I shall be compelled to call out the troops. 
Then several will perish. I shall have to give him up ! 

The weak ruler sent for a ewer of water, and standing 
in his place he washed his hands before them all, and 
again declared the innocence of Jesus, but by this sym- 
bolic act endeavored to throw all responsibility from 
himself, saying to the mob, " I am innocent of the blood 
of this just person. But see you to it ! " The infuriated 
multitude answered: " His blood be on us and on our 
children ! " Then, deceiving himself and drugging his 
conscience, Pilate consented to their demand, and re- 
leased Barabbas to them. 

Then Pilate caused Jesus to be scourged. The Roman 
scourging surpassed the Hebrew in all the particulars of 



THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 299 

severity. In the latter only the shoulders were bared ; 
in the former the whole person: in the latter the stripes 
were limited to forty, save one ; in the former there was 
no limit. It was the punishment given to a slave. The 
stripes of the lash were loaded with bones or metallic 
fragments. The scourging of those who were to be cru- 
cified was so frightful that the condemned frequently 
escaped the cross by dying under the thongs. 

Then the soldiers of Pilate took Jesus away into the 
common hall, called the Prgetorium, probably in the 
castle of Antonia, and gathered the whole company of the 
guard, which usually numbered about four hundred men. 
They stripped Him again, and on His torn and bleeding 
shoulders put a scarlet robe, probably some old military 
coat from the wardrobe of the guardroom. Then they 
plaited a crown from the twigs of some thorny growth. 
It may have been the Syrian acacia, the thorns of which 
are as long as an ordinary finger. The more painful as 
well as humiliating the instrument of their mockery, the 
more acceptable it would be. Then they put a reed in 
His hand as a mock scepter. Then they knelt before Him 
and ridiculed Him and His nation, saying: " Hail! King 
of the Jews." And they spat on Him. He was bound. 
The reed was laid in His hands, but He did not hold it. 
He was perfectly passive. It fell. Some of the guard 
seized it, and with it drove the thorn-crown down upon 
His head. They smote and mocked Him, varying their 
indignities. 

Pilate looked on this wild scene. We can conjecture 
his thoughts from his actions. He must have regarded 
this whole affair with mingled feelings of perplexity, awe, 
and apprehension. He had never seen such a sufferer. 



300 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

Most majestic amid ridicule, most serene amid tortures, 
here was a man fit to be king anywhere. Yet He had 
not sought to use His marvelous personal influence for 
personal advancement. There was Barabbas, coarse and 
brutal, being the vilest kind of person and doing the 
very things which the priests had charged upon Jesus. 
If being seditious was such a heinous crime in their eyes, 
why should they not desire the destruction of Barabbas, 
who had been convicted of repeated acts under circum- 
stances of great aggravation, and why should they desire 
the destruction of Jesus, who was charged with sedition, 
but against whom there was proved no single seditious 
word or act ? It was a great puzzle. Some other basis 
than loyalty to Rome lay under this extraordinary zeal 
of the priests. Pilate determined to make one more 
effort to save the life of this wonderful Sufferer. 

Taking Jesus, thorn-crowned, covered about with the 
old robe that burlesqued royalty, faint, worn, haggard, 
as He must have been after the night and morning of 
agony and torture, he placed the Prisoner once more 
before the people, reasserting his conviction of the inno- 
cence of Jesus. He pointed to this weak and apparently 
helpless man. He showed how lonely and friendless and 
powerless He seemed. Jerusalem should be too mag- 
nanimous, and Rome too lofty, to crush out this poor 
peasant-prophet for fear He should become too strong for 
Church and State. He said to them : " Ecce Homo !" 
" Behold the man." As if he had said : " Can that be a 
dangerous person?" It was a pathetic appeal. Even 
Pilate's voice may have been unsteady in making this 
utterance. But the Church hate was not to be touched. 
Jesus was to be destroyed. " Crucify Him ! Crucify 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 301 

Him ! Give Him the extreme punishment of a slave/' 
they cried. Pilate said : " Take you Him and crucify 
Him ; for I find no fault in Him." 

The crafty priests, determined, if possible, to make 
Pilate a tool in their hands by inducing him to acknowl- 
edge their verdict, making him thus not a judge in a 
court of original jurisdiction, but a mere recorder of 
their authoritative decisions, said to Pilate : ' ' We have a 
law, and according to the law He ought to die, because 
He made Himself the Son of God/' What definite idea 
this last phrase conveyed to the mind of pagan Pilate 
we can not tell, but the whole statement made his soul 
afraid. He was growing weaker and more superstitious. 
He went back into the judgment-hall and sent for Jesus, 
and said to Him: " Whence are You ?" The wonderful 
Prisoner, who had uttered no complaint, and showed no 
nervousness, and seemed to take less interest in the 
whole tragedy than any spectator, held His peace. 
"What \" said Pilate, "do You not speak to me? Do 
You not know that I have power to crucify You, and 
power to release You?" Jesus answered: "You could 
have no power against Me, unless it were given you from 
above; on this account he who has delivered Me to you 
has the greater sin." In the judgment of Jesus, Caia- 
phas is worse than Pilate. 

All this increased in Pilate a desire to release Jesus. 
The Prisoner was guilty of no crime, was apparently 
capable of no disturbance, had no marks of wickedness 
in His history or His manners, had been very popular 
with the masses in the rural districts, had displayed the 
most extraordinary composure during a period of extraor- 
dinary peril, had the reputation of a miracle-worker, 



302 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

had excited the dreams of Pilate's wife, had called Him- 
self the Son of God, and was manifestly the object of 
intense hatred on the part of the priesthood. Again 
Pilate sought to release Jesus. But the churchmen had 
kept their strongest form of argument for their last. 
They returned to the political aspect of the affair, and 
put it before Pilate thus: " If you release this man you 
are not Caesar's friend: whoever makes himself a king 
speaks against Caesar." 

The phrase " Caesar's friend," Amicus Ccesaris, had 
not only the ordinary signification of the words, but was 
a title of honor which the emperors were accustomed to 
bestow upon their representatives ruling over subjugated 
peoples. It was a most ingenious way of putting the 
case. It struck Pilate on his weakest side. He was a 
lover of place, an office-seeker, who considered the loss 
of his political position as the greatest misfortune, as is 
shown in the fact that when that did befall him he 
retired to Gaul and committed suicide. The priests knew 
their man, and Pilate knew how insecurely already he 
held his seat, and that such an accusation, if pressed 
with show of evidence, would be his ruin at Rome. 
Tiberius was suspicious. Pilate had been closeted with 
Jesus. The trial had been informal. They now had much 
to show. If he had only taken the strong and digni- 
fied position which became an Imperial Procurator, and 
released Jesus as soon as he was convinced that He was 
innocent, and began to feel perhaps that He was divine, 
Pilate would have saved himself; but he had vacillated 
so long and grown so weak that this last push toppled 
him from all his intellectual and moral proprieties. He 
fell. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 303 

Jesus was brought forth and placed in the judgment- 
seat, in what was called the Pavement, from the tessel- 
lated pavement in front of the judge, and in Hebrew 
Gabbatha, the etymology of which is not quite clear. 
The formal ceremonials of a trial were now resumed. 
Pilate was going to condemn Jesus; but, enraged at the 
defeat of his efforts to release Him, he called the atten- 
tion of the Jewish leaders to the pale and poor prisoner 
at the bar, and said in derision: " Behold your King ! " 
But they called out, " Away, away, crucify Him ! " 
Still taunting them, knowing that by pronouncing the 
sentence he should be secure at Eome, and venting his 
rage on them, he said: " Shall I crucify your King ?" 
They answered: " We have no king but Caesar!" 

It was the shriek of a dying nationality. Their ear- 
liest ancestors had lived under a theocracy whose King 
had held court in a pillar of flame and on the top of 
rocking Sinai. They had had no king but Jehovah. 
Their descendants had had such kings as the great 
David and the super- splendid Solomon. This very 
generation of men, who were howling around a pagan 
court-house to secure the condemnation of Jesus, had 
had hopes of a theocratic Messiah. But their thirst for 
innocent blood was uncontrollable. They threw up all 
hopes of the future as they did all traditions of the past. 
They lifted the casket that contained the treasure of 
their nationality and flung it into the maelstrom of the 
Roman dominion. " We have no king but Caesar ! " 
The nationality of Abraham and David and Solomon 
and the Maccabees was surrendered in spirit, as it had 
been captured in form, to an imperialism whose repre- 
sentative was the dark, suspicious, cruel, and debased 



304 THE .GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

Tiberius. " We have no king but Caesar ! " Judaism's 
" loyalty" was Judaism's doom. So perishes every 
church and people and man that will " have no king 
but Caesar." 

Then Pilate sealed their fate and his own by deliver- 
ing Jesus to be crucified. What the precise form of 
sentence was in this case we can not now know. The 
usual formula was, Ibis ad crucem, " Co to the cross." 



XXII. 
lEartij's Greatest STragrtig. 



John XIX. 

(17) They took Jesus therefore : and He went out, bearing the cross 
for Himself, unto the 'place called The place of a skull, which is called 
in Hebrew Golgotha : (18) where they crucified Him, and with Him 
two others, on either side one, and Jesus in the midst. (19) And 
Pilate wrote a title also, and put it on the cross. And there was 
written, "JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE 
JEWS." (20) This title therefore read many of the Jews: for the 
place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city : and it was writ- 
ten in Hebrew, and in Latin, and in Greek. (21) The chief priests 
of the Jews therefore said to Pilate, "Write not, ' The King of the 
Jews' ; but, that He said, ' I am King of the Jews.' " (22) Pilate 
answered, " What I have written I have written. " (23) The soldiers 
therefore, when they had crucified Jesus, took His garments and made 
four parts, to every soldier a part ; and also the coat : now the coat 
was without seam, woven from the top throughout. (24) They said 
therefore one to another ; "Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose 
it shall be": that the Scripture might be fulfilled, which saith, " They 
parted My garments among them, and upon My vesture did they 
cast lots." These things therefore the soldiers did. (25) But there 
were standing by the cross of Jesus His mother, and His mother's 
sister, Mary, the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. (26) When 
Jesus therefore saw His mother and the disciple standing by whom 
He loved, He saith unto His mother, "Woman, behold thy son!" 
(27) Then saith He to the disciple, "Behold thy mother!" And 
from that hour the disciple took her unto his own home. (28) After 
this Jesus, knowing that all things are now finished, that the Script- 
ure might be accomplished, saith, " I thirst." (29) There was set 
there a vessel full of vinegar : so they put a sponge full of the vin- 
egar upon hyssop, and brought it to His mouth. (30) When Jesus 
therefore had received the vinegar, He said, "It is finished" : and 
He bowed His head and gave up His spirit. 



EARTH'S GREATEST TRAGEDY. 
CALVARY. 

AS the trial of Jesus was altogether the most impor- 
tant that ever occurred in the courts of this world, 
so the execution of His sentence was the most tremen- 
dous event that ever came into the history of mankind. 

Ibis ad crucem, " Go to the cross/' said Pilate, when 
his weakness had succumbed to the persistent malice of 
our Lord's persecutors. That was the usual form of the 
Roman sentence. As a condemned malefactor Jesus 
had no defense from any indignities any man might 
choose to heap upon Him. When the servants of the 
priests and of Pilate had satisfied themselves with their 
cruel sport, they led Him away for crucifixion. 

It was a part of the punishment that the convicted 
should bear his own cross. If the cross be such an 
instrument of torture as it has been represented to us by 
the artists, no single man could have borne it any dis- 
tance. Ordinarily, however, the convicts did. There 
were three men crucified on this occasion, and two of 
them had no difficulty in bearing each his cross. Jesus 
also started in the procession from the castle, bearing 
His. Perhaps the order was something like this : First 
rode the centurion in command of the execution. Then 
came one of the robbers, guarded by four soldiers ; then 
Jesus, similarly guarded ; and then the second robber 
under the same guard, Each convict may have been 



308 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL INSIGHT. 

preceded by a soldier bearing a board on which was 
written with gypsum the name of the crime for which 
he was condemned. Or, such a board was suspended, 
as was sometimes done, from the neck of each convict. 
The reason assigned for this custom was that it was pos- 
sible that the convict might, on his very way to the 
place of execution, be met by some one who had not 
heard of his trial and yet be in possession of information 
which would reverse or mitigate the sentence : and the 
prisoner was given that last chance. 

So toward the city gate they went. It is to be recol- 
lected that in that night Jesus had had His parting with 
His disciples, had been betrayed by one, denied by an- 
other, deserted by all; that also He had spent a night of 
physical torture ; that His flesh had been lacerated by 
the scourge, so that He was suffering a double punish- 
ment; that His head was throbbing with the pain pro- 
duced by the thorns which had been pressed into His 
flesh; and that He had endured enough mental and physi- 
cal torture to make the most robust man unable to carry 
any cross heavy enough to serve its intended purpose. 
He fell under its weight ; and there He lay, for both Jew 
and Eoman were too proud to lift the cross. At that 
moment a man named Simon came upon the scene. The 
feast had drawn to Jerusalem Jews from all points of 
the globe where they had settled. This Simon had 
come from Cyrene in Africa. He does not appear to 
have taken any interest in the trial, or indeed to have 
known any thing about it. But coming upon the pale 
and wasted Sufferer as He lay under His cross upon the 
ground, it is probable that he uttered some sentiment 
of surprised pity. It was enough to suggest to the 



THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 309 

centurion the military impressment of Simon : so he was 
compelled to lift and carry the cross of Jesus. 

After Jesus had been relieved of His load the proces- 
sion was resumed, and it grew as it proceeded. People 
came forth from their houses. A great company of persons 
had gathered, and there were many women among them, 
drawn together by the strange curiosity which is felt to 
see those who are about to die. These women, without 
special sympathy with Jesus as a religious teacher, but 
having their womanly compassion stirred by seeing the 
sufferings of a man whose appearance contrasted with 
that of the robbers, who were also carrying their crosses 
to the place of crucifixion, broke out into bewailing 
lamentations. It was a touch of nature. The men 
were all against Him. The temper of the mob was 
opposed to any pity for Him. These women did not 
love Him as tenderly as Mary of Bethany, as passion- 
ately as Mary of Magdala ; but they were women, and 
women generally instinctively know the true man ; and 
they wept. It moved Jesus. It was the only incident on 
the way to the crucifixion which seems to have arrested 
His attention. He said nothing when He fell beneath 
the cross, nothing when they lifted it from His shoulder. 
But who can bear a woman's tears ? Jesus turned and 
said to them, " Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for 
Me, but weep for yourselves and for your children ; for 
see ! the days are coming in which they shall say, 
' Happy are the barren, and the wombs that bear not, 
and the breasts that suckled not/ Then shall they 
begin to say to the mountains, ' Fall on us ; ' and to 
the hills, ' Cover us/ For if they do these things in the 
green tree, what shall be done in the dry ? " 



310 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

He was then brought to a place which was called 
Golgotha in the Hebrew tongue, meaning "skull/' It 
is to be noticed (1) that the Hebrew Golgotha, the 
Greek Kr anion, and the Latin Calvaria, and the En- 
glish Skull, all mean the same thing ; (2) that the 
word " Calvary " occurs in the authorized English ver- 
sion only once, Luke xxiii., 33 ; and that the place of 
crucifixion is not called "the place of skulls," but 
simply " Skull," as moderns call certain hill-formations 
" Head," as " C assarts Head " in the Alleghany 
Mountains. Its formation probably suggested its 
name. 

Where was Golgotha ? If there be any thing quite 
certain in the topography of Jerusalem it is that it was 
not where there now stands what is called the Church 
of the Holy Sepulcher. It is in tradition that this 
church was erected to indicate the spot of the cruci- 
fixion. That may be a mistake. It may have been 
originally intended simply to commemorate the great 
event. It has no claim to reverence. It has been the 
scene of disgraceful conflicts between the Latin and the 
Greek monks. It would seem that no devout traveler 
can have been in that edifice on a feast-day and not 
carried away a disagreeable memory of that disgraceful 
show-house. The writer of these pages has a grateful 
recollection of the kind protection given him by the 
Mahometan soldiers who preserve the peace between the 
Christian sects in that unholy church. It would seem 
that any gentleman would prefer to be a decent Turk 
than to be such a Christian as the ecclesiastics that cele- 
brate Easter in the misnamed " Church of the Holy 
Sepulcher." 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT 311 

The true site must meet all the conditions of the his- 
tory. These are six, namely : 1. It was without the 
then existing walls of Jerusalem (Matt, xxvii., 31, 32 ; 
xxviii., 11 ; and Paul in Hebrews xiii., 12). 2. It was 
near the city (John xix., 20). 3. It was popularly 
known as "The Skull" (Matt, xxvii., 33; Mark xv., 
22 ; Luke xxiii., 33 ; John xix., 27). 4. It was near a 
gate to a leading thoroughfare (Matt, xxvii., 39; Mark 
xv., 29 ; Luke xxiii., 26). 5. It was a conspicuous 
spot (Matt, xxvii., 55 ; Mark xv., 40 ; Luke xxiii., 49). 
6. It was near sepulchers and gardens (John xix., 38- 
42). Not one of these propositions can be affirmed of 
the spot on which the Church of the Holy Sepulcher 
stands, which is a low place inside the old walls, off the 
thoroughfares, and where no tombs would be allowed. 
All these six particulars meet in an elevation called the 
Grotto of Jeremiah, a short distance north of the Da- 
mascus Gate. It is outside the city. It is near. It is 
conspicuously shaped like a skull, and from almost 
every point of view reminds the beholders of a skull. 
It is near what is still the entrance to the great thor- 
oughfare from the north of Judaea and all Upper Syria. 
It can be seen from almost every elevation about Jeru- 
salem, and looks down on hills that look down on the 
modern Church of the Sepulcher. Eight years after he 
had written this decision of his judgment in " The 
Light of the Nations," p. 666, the writer of this para- 
graph was in Jerusalem. The first movement was to 
find Calvary. He had forgotten that the names of the 
gates of the city had been changed, and was greatly 
disappointed when, going out at St. Stephen's Gate, he 
faced the Valley of Jehoshaphat and the Mount of Olives, 



312 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

and nothing that could be taken for Calvary. Walking 
to the northeast angle of the city walls there burst upon 
him the sight of a knoll about seventy feet high, and so 
like a skull in shape that it might be supposed to be an 
artificial formation, built up to represent a human skull. 
It is scarcely more than three hundred feet from the 
north wall, fronts the Damascus Gate, which was for- 
merly called St. Stephen's Gate, and in every particular 
meets all the characteristics of Calvary that can be 
gathered from New Testament statements. 

Before proceeding to crucify Jesus, the Roman sol- 
diers offered Him a drink composed of sour wine, in 
which myrrh had been dissolved. Jesus refused. He 
would have nothing to dim the clearness of His vision or 
enfeeble the vigor of His intellect. Perhaps we might 
gather strength from the Immortal Sufferer's example 
to resist temptations to take narcotics when we must 
endure pain in the path of duty. It is an outrage to 
accuse Jesus of weakness or cowardice. Worn in body 
until He was as feeble as a young man could be, His 
whole behavior during the twenty-four hours from the 
evening of Thursday, the 6th of April, until the even- 
ing of Friday, the 7th, rises to a height of heroism not 
touched by any other human endurance. 

It was now nine o'clock in the morning of Friday. 
They had laid the cross upon the ground, had stripped 
and stretched the person of Jesus upon it, had driven 
the nails through His hands and His feet, had lifted 
the instrument of torture with its precious Victim, and 
had let it down into the hole which had been prepared. 
Two robbers were crucified with Him. It does not appear 
that Jesus was submitted to any torture beyond that 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 313 

which was inseparable from crucifixion, and beyond 
what the two robbers endured. His being crucified 
with such ruffians may have been intended as an indig- 
nity ; but perhaps simply came to pass because it was 
customary to have executions at this feast. John seems 
to have attached no importance to the fact, his simple 
statement being "they crucified Him and two others 
with Him, one on either side and Jesus in the midst." 
But it was a fulfillment of the prophecy in Isaiah (liii., 
12) : " He was numbered with the transgressors." 
While His executioners were performing their work, 
Jesus prayed for them : " Father, forgive them, for 
they know not what they do." It was touching and 
characteristic. He does not say, "I forgive you." 
That would be to allude too distinctly to the wrongs He 
was suffering. He thought of their guilt, not His own 
sufferings. It was a prayer of pure unselfishness. 

THE FIRST WORD FROM THE CROSS. 

When they had set up the cross the soldiers sat down 
to watch it, as their duty was. The usage was to crucify 
convicts naked, and the clothing fell to the executioners 
as a perquisite. In the case of Jesus they had no diffi- 
culty with His outer garments, but when they came to 
His inmost article of dress they found it a strange 
fabric, without a seam, woven throughout. It may have 
been the product of maternal love. It may have been 
the handiwork of the tender and loving Mary of Beth- 
any, or the passionate Mary of Magdala. How little did 
love think, as love's fingers wove it, to what torture 
should finally come the precious body it was intended 
to cover. Something about it made even rude Roman 



314 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

soldiers hesitate. They determined not to tear it ; 
they had their dice with them to amuse them in the 
long hours of the crucifixion watch, and so they settled 
the matter. Slight as it seems, it was the fulfillment of 
the prophecy in Psalms xxii., 16, 18: " The assembly of 
the wicked have inclosed Me; they have pierced My 
hands. and My feet; they part My garments among them 
and cast lots for My vesture." The Eoman soldiers 
knew nothing of this prediction. No man knows when 
he is fulfilling a prophecy. 

The specification of that for which Jesus had been 
condemned was now placed over His head on the cross. 
It was written by Pilate, His judge. It was in Hebrew, 
in Greek, and in Latin, so that all beholders might be 
able to read it. It was written in the language of the 
Palestine populace, of the cultivated foreigners, and of 
the Homan officials. The Hebrew was the language of 
the civilization of religion; the Greek was the language 
of the civilization of culture; the Latin was the lan- 
guage of the civilization of power. The cross was the 
point of juncture of all forms of previous civilization, 
and together they have since flowed in a conjoined and 
constantly augmenting stream, so that the civilization 
inaugurated by that crucified Man is that in which all the 
best, the most vigorous, the most durable, in religion, 
in culture, and in civil government, is to be found in the 
nineteenth century after His death. 

This is the inscription: 

b fiaoi\ev<; rdv 'lovdaicjv 
Bex JudcBorum 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 315 

Thus Rome officially decided that Jesus had no guilt, 
for it was no crime that His name should be Jesus, that 
He should have been literally or somewhat figuratively 
a king of the Jews. It is the assertion of Caesar's gov- 
ernment that Jesus was without crime. Personally to 
Pilate it was more. It was a gratification to be able to 
fling this slur in the faces of the persistent ecclesiastics 
who had coerced him. It is as if he had said: "This 
poor forlorn peasant, hanging on this cross, is good 
enough king for these Jews." Or it might mean, 
"They said they would have no king but Caesar: I 
crucify Jesus; if He be their king He is a dead king, 
and the nails by which I fasten Him to the cross bind 
them to their rejection of all kings but Caesar." 

The high-priests were not slow to see this. They 
chose, notwithstanding their averment that they would 
have no king but Caesar, to leave that question open. 
They were very loyal ecclesiastics, and the history of 
the world shows how far such men are to be trusted. 
Pilate had no faith in them. They rushed back to his 
palace, where he must have sat moody over the events 
of the day in which he had played so conspicuous and 
disagreeable a part. They called his attention to the char- 
acter of the epigraph on the cross. They prayed him to 
change it, at least so as to show that it was only a claim 
set up by Jesus. His surly answer was, " What I have 
written, I have written." With that he dismissed them. 
It had been better for Pilate to have been so unbending 
earlier in the tragedy. 

The cross was set up beside a thoroughfare. Those 
who passed by saw it. Some one of these recollected 
what had been testified at the trial, so called, and he 



316 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

wagged his head and taunted Jesus, saying: "You who 
destroy the Temple, and build it in three days, save Your- 
self, if You are the Son of God, and come down from 
the cross." This reviling was not confined to the lower 
populace. The chief priests took it up, and probably 
walking in front of the cross, or standing near enough 
for Jesus to hear, they said among themselves, not 
addressing Him: "He saved others; He can not save 
Himself. If He be the Messiah, let Him save Himself. 
He the King of Israel ! Let Him come down from 
the cross, and we will believe on Him. He trusted in 
God; let Him now deliver Him, if He will; for He said, 
f I am the Son of God/" 

The Roman soldiers, having no ecclesiastical bias and 
no theological views, began to echo the taunt of the 
populace and the priests. They mocked Him. That 
apparently forlorn and helpless peasant-prophet on the 
cross made great contrast with Caesar's grandeur on the 
Palatine Hill in Rome, and with the barbaric splendor 
of some of the kings these soldiers had helped to con- 
quer. The soldiers said to Him directly, " If You are 
the king of the Jews, save Yourself." They would like 
to see Him do it. It would be a marvel to see a man 
disengage himself from the cross. If He should attempt 
it, He would find Roman valor superior to any legerde- 
main or terrifying magic. If the Jews around these 
soldiers were not utterly obtuse, they must have felt 
that this insult reacted upon them in their civil and 
their ecclesiastical positions. These rude warriors from 
the Tiber were stamping out their State and their 
Church in Jesus. 

Even one of the thieves, in the recklessness which 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 317 

befalls men who are about to perish, began his raillery. 
"If You are the Messiah," said he, "save Yourself and 
us, my comrade and myself." But the other robber was 
not so obdurate. He rebuked his comrade : "Do you 
not fear God, seeing that you are in the same condem- 
nation ? And we indeed justly ; for we are receiving the 
due reward of our deeds ; but this man has done nothing 
amiss." He then turned his eyes toward Jesus and 
said, "Jesus, remember me when You shall come into 
Your kingdom." Here was a marvelous confession. 
What this man could have known of Jesus prior to this 
time we have now no means of learning. He may have 
known His whole history, and much as it had interested 
him, he had not until this moment been able to see in 
Jesus the sign of His being Israel's king. 

THE SECOND WORD FROM THE CROSS. 

Jesus did not repel his faith. He accepted it. The 
man had a sense of guilt and helplessness. He believed 
in the power of Jesus to save him somehow. He was so 
humble and modest that he did not interrupt the suffer- 
ing Jesus with a plea that He would help him now. He 
was willing to die for his offense against society. But 
he felt that Jesus was a royal personage and had a king- 
dom. He plaintively begged that when He began His 
reign Jesus would not wholly forget His fellow-sufferer 
in Golgotha. The accents of the pleading came to 
Jesus amid the hisses and groans and taunts and hate- 
ful uproar of His infuriated enemies. Jesus looked at 
the dying man and smoothed his rough passage to eter- 
nity with this reply : " I assuredly say to you that you 
shall be with Me in Paradise to-day." 



318 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

What perfect confidence is here ; what an assurance 
of power ; what a claim over the future ; what a pledge 
to another ! He spoke as one to whom Paradise belonged 
— who held the keys of the garden of the Future and 
Immortality. Bound upon the cross, He ruled the 
spiritual world, and pledged to meet His fellow-sufferer 
on the other side of the grave. Together on the cross, 
they should be together in happiness. There was no 
confusion of ideas here, no loss of confidence, no break- 
down, no despair. He makes no reply to raillery, but 
has a quick, loving answer for faith. 

Jesus was not totally forsaken by His friends. The 
majority of the disciples had been scattered by the tragic 
events of the preceding night. Judas had betrayed 
Him, and Peter had denied Him, and the others had 
fled except John and the women. The beloved disciple 
came back. Love in him was stronger than terror. The 
women came in full force from the first, and through 
the morning " all His acquaintance," that had come 
from Galilee, became sympathizing witnesses of His 
sufferings. Among the women are named His mother, 
and His aunt, Mary Cleophas, and Salome the mother 
of James and John, and Mary of Magdala. There 
were many other women. These all stood afar off. 
He seems to have had no conversation with His 
friends during the first three hours. As it neared 
noon there was coming upon Him a renewal of that 
heart-agony which had made the bloody sweat of G-eth- 
semane. He looked upon His friends. He made no 
explanation of His position as being so contrary to 
all they had hoped and desired. It seemed as if His 
was to be a lost cause, and as if His very name was 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 319 

being consigned to endless ignominy. He saw His 
mother standing near. She and John had approached, 
drawn by their intense love, which controlled every 
other sentiment, whether of fear or disappointment. 

THE THIRD WORD FROM THE CROSS. 

Jesus had a clean, clear human heart. He saw the 
sword entering Mary's soul. He did not call her 
"mother"; He gave Himself no such indulgence. 
Looking at John, he said: " Woman, see your son!'' 
Looking at Mary, and addressing John, He said: "Be- 
hold your mother." It is as if the feeling He had for 
Mary in that hour was a sentiment He entertained 
toward all womanhood that is stricken and forsaken. 
"Woman": that was the dying Son's title for His 
mother. He had no title for His nearest male friend. 

It was midday — the sixth, the sacred hour. The sun 
was in the splendor of a Syrian noon. l Then came a 
mysterious thing. The earth began to darken. It was 
not an eclipse. It was at the full of the moon of the 
Passover. The darkness did not begin in the sky, but 
on the earth, as we learn from Luke, who, of all the 
biographers of Jesus, seems the most careful observer of 
physical phenomena. The darkness spread itself out- 
ward and upward until the sun was shrouded. It was a 
darkness which obliterated outlines. The Temple, the 
tower, the city walls disappeared. The people in Jeru- 
salem could no longer see the crowd swaying about in 
Golgotha. The priests lost sight of their Victim. The 
crucified thieves could no more see each other. The 
Eoman soldiers could not discern their dice. Mary of 
Magdala could not see Jesus. For three hours men 



320 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

stood, or sat, or lay down. Jesus was in an agony. It 
was a long three hours for the Sufferer, for the persecu- 
tors, for Pilate, for the friends of Jesus. The world had 
dropped down into the core of darkness. All was night. 
Heaven, earth, the heart of man, the minds of the 
wicked and the souls of the just were all in darkness. 
When Mary's Son was being born midnight became a 
splendor. When Mary's Son was being slain midnoon 
became a horror. 

THE FOURTH WORD FROM THE CROSS. 

At two o'clock the darkness passed away as mysteri- 
ously as it had come. The pent-up agony of Jesus 
found vent. He shrieked. His cry was articulate. The 
biographers have preserved the very syllables. It was in 
His mother-tongue, the Aramaean, and reminds us of 
an observed fact, that men in dying frequently speak 
their original dialect most accurately. The words with 
which Jesus thrilled the crowd were these: ^Ap?^ rvih 
? n ' <N ^rON , Elohee', Elohee', lammawh' sebakthanee' , 
"My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me ? 

It is not necessary, perhaps, to say more than that 
the august Sufferer was consoling Himself in His agony 
by repeating the twenty-second Psalm, which from the 
days of David had been the comfort of distressed saints, 
and had always been regarded as a Messianic psalm. 

The light came back to the hills, the city, and Gol- 
gotha. Men raised themselves. The cloud had rolled 
away, and with the clearing sky came the loud cry of 
Jesus. Perhaps in that darkness the consciences of His 
murderers began to be painfully uneasy. They caught 
the first words of the cry, "Elohee, Elohee" Elijah 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 321 

among the Jews was the patron of the distressed. More- 
over, it had been prophesied that Elijah was to precede 
the Messias. Some said, "He calls Elijah." The 
others said, " Stop ! let us see if Elijah will come to 
save Him." Perhaps the power as well as the hour of 
darkness had passed away. Perhaps Elijah was about 
to come. Perhaps the tawny, terrible prophet of Car- 
mel would in a few moments descend into Golgotha, set 
free the Prisoner from the cross, and with superhuman 
power tear down, and with the fierceness of one at whose 
prayer fire fell down from heaven, scatter priest and 
procurator, Church and State, Jew and Gentile, and 
inaugurate the splendors of the Messianic reign. 

THE FIFTH, SIXTH, AND SEVENTH WORDS FROM 

THE CROSS. 

This cry continued to puzzle the materialists who 
stood around the extraordinary Sufferer, until another 
saying came from Jesus. He simply said, "I thirst." 
Physiologically and psychologically this may indicate that 
His agony was closing. The spirit which had been so 
strung up that it could think of nothing which merely 
concerned His body, was now relaxing. He was passing 
from out the hour and from under the power of dark- 
ness, going out of a battle wounded but victorious. It 
may be noted as indicating Him to be in the full pos- 
session of His faculties, in the fullness of His bodily 
strength, and by no means suffering death as an effect 
of crucifixion, seeing that this is only the beginning of 
that terrible thirst which burns in those who are linger- 
ing on the cross. This circumstance seems quite inci- 
dentally mentioned by John (xix., 28), and by some 



322 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

other of the biographers, and yet it is of great impor- 
tance. In response one of the Eoman soldiers ran and 
took a branch of hyssop, a plant probably growing near, 
the stock of which was about two feet long. So low did 
the crucified hang that when the soldier fastened a 
sponge to this stock, and filled it with the sour common 
wine, or vinegar, which they mingled with their water, 
it was quite easy to lay it on the mouth of Jesus. He 
took it and said, "It is finished." Then calling out 
with a loud voice, "Father, into Thy hands I commit 
My spirit," He bowed His head and died. 

The darkness which had come upon the whole land 
had reached its consummation in an earthquake, which 
rent the rocks in the neighborhood, and so moved the 
Temple that, at the very hour when worshipers were 
thronging into the holy place, and the priests were 
kindling the lamps before the veil which divided the 
holy from the holiest place, that strong, well-woven, 
annually-renewed veil split from top to bottom, and laid 
open before the startled attendants that sacred spot 
where the wings of the cherubim overshadowed the 
mercy-seat in the ark of the covenant, a spot no feet but 
those of the high-priest might tread, and a sight which 
no eyes but his might behold. The stone sepulchers 
around the city were broken by this convulsion in nature, 
and the stone doors were jarred off their hinges, and a 
few days after some of the inhabitants of Jerusalem 
were visited by holy people whom they had seen dead 
and buried. 

The Roman centurion who was in charge of the exe- 
cution remained with his guard through all these terri- 
fying phenomena. They had ceased to amuse them- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 323 

selves with dice. They stood watching the Victim. 
When their commander saw what was done he exclaimed, 
" Certainly this was a righteous man. Certainly this 
was a Son of God." He had seen men die, civilized and 
barbarian. He knew what Eoman fortitude was. He 
knew what the crucifixion was. But here was some- 
thing different from all he had ever witnessed. The 
fact is, that Jesus did not seem to come under the 
supreme effects of physical torture. He did not seem 
to die, in the sense that the soul was pressed from the 
body by pain, but He "gave up the ghost." It was 
apparently a voluntary dismissal on His own part of His 
soul from His body. No felon ever died so. Moreover, 
the mythology of his country had trained the soldier to 
believe that in earlier days the gods had come among 
men. He looked at Jesus. His mind ran rapidly over 
the phenomena which had filled the last six hours. The 
conviction came upon him, that if ever any of the kith 
and kin of the gods had dwelt in flesh, this was one of 
them. The Jews had condemned a good man: that was 
an outrage. They had caused the crucifixion of a god: 
that was a horror. It was the verdict of a pagan on one 
of the crimes of the Church. 

Take all the literature of all languages and all ages, 
including the Hebrew Scriptures, take all the finest and 
highest and best thoughts and imaginings of godhood 
recorded by the poets and orators, and let the greatest 
genius of our race fuse them into one representation of 
deity, as the Greek sculptor combined all the beauties 
of all the women into one figure of surpassing grace ; 
how far that would fall below the representation in the 
Evangely of the character and conduct of Jesus during 



324 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

tlie last twenty-four hours of His life. The representa- 
tion of Jupiter, even the representation of Jehovah, fails 
to equal in godliness, in all that the noblest, most gifted, 
most high-hearted men and women desire in a god, the 
representation of the Jesus in the New Testament. No 
greater god has been conceived. If we do not find God 
in Christ, then John should be our God, if we could 
find John. If Jesus Christ be not God, then the person 
who created Him must be God. If the things writ- 
ten about Jesus in the Evangely be not true, then the 
Evangelists created Him, and they are worthy the 
adoration of men and of angels. But if those things be 
true, there is no One higher in the universe for angels 
and men to worship. 



XXIII. 
SFije i&egsstone Jfart of (Efjustianitg. 






John XX. 

(11) Mary was standing without at the tomb weeping : so, as she 
wept, she stooped to the tomb; (12) and she seeth two angels in white 
sitting, one at the head, and one at the feet, where the body of Jesus 
had lain. (13) And they say unto her, "Woman, why weepest 
thou ?" She saith unto them, "Because they have taken away my 
Lord, and I know not where they have laid Him." (14) When she 
had thus said, she turned herself back, and seeth Jesus standing, 
and knew not that it was Jesus. (15) Jesus saith unto her, " Woman, 
why weepest thou ? whom seekest thou ?" She, supposing Him to be 
the gardener, saith unto Him, "Sir, if thou hast borne Him hence, 
tell me where thou hast laid Him, and I will take Him away." (16) 
Jesus saith unto her "Mary." She turned herself, and saith unto 
Him in Hebrew, u Rabboni" ; which is to say, "Master" [Teacher]. 

(17) Jesus saith to her, " Touch Me not ; for I am not yet ascended 
unto the Father : but go unto My brethren, and say to them, I ascend 
unto My Father and your Father, and My God and your God." 

(18) Mary Magdalene cometh and telleth [the good news to] the dis- 
ciples, "I have seen the Lord "; and how that He had said these 
things unto her. 



THE KEY-STONE FACT OF CHRISTIANITY. 
THE CRUCIAL QUESTION. 

S CHRISTIANITY has for its logical basis one fact, 
^^ the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead 
in the body which was actually crucified. Every highly 
intelligent person approaching Christianity from the 
outside, and carefully and rationally reading over its 
documents, would fix on the resurrection of Jesus from 
the dead as being the crucial question of the whole case. 
If Jesus did so rise, all His claims are established, and 
all the other miracles are entirely and easily credible ; 
if He did not so rise, the whole system of Christianity 
falls. 

He will perceive that Jesus predicted His own resur- 
rection from the dead, and held it as a sufficient ground 
for the belief that He was divine. To all men of all 
ages who believe that there is a God, this fact, if it can 
be established, must confirm the- divinity of our Lord. 
If there be a God, He must hold the gift of life, the 
power over existence, in His own hand, or there must 
be a life-giving agent in the universe outside of Him- 
self. That extra being, if he can give life at pleasure, 
has the power of contravening the wishes of God and 
robbing Him of His glory by peopling His universe with 
those who would not be His subjects. This is so mani- 
fest, that all who believe in a God believe that life and 
death are in His hands. Then, if it can be shown that 



328 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL IKSIGHT. 

Jesus arose from the dead, either God favored an impo- 
sition by giving it its seal of perfection and most glori- 
ous foundation of hope — an imposition which was to 
raise the impostor up to His own throne of supreme 
dominion — or else Jesus was holy, and, consequently, 
by His own words — for He must have been true under 
the circumstances — He was God. He raised Himself, if 
His words be true — an unparalleled circumstance even 
in the history of miracles. One who held delegated 
power from God might raise another ; but only a divine 
Being — God Himself — could raise His own assumed 
body from the grave. If this occurred, then the 
prophecies, which the Jews believed to refer to the Son 
of God, and His own prophetic speech when He spoke 
to His disciples about rearing the Temple again in three 
days, and His express application of the type of Jonah 
to Himself, and His other and even more distinct decla- 
rations of the fact, were wonderfully fulfilled, and Jesus 
Christ is God, and Christianity is true ! 

HE WAS DEAD. 

Let us examine the evidence. On Friday, April 7th, 
a.d. 30, at three o'clock, Jesus was hanging on a cross. 
He had been there several hours. He had not a single 
friend in the world who was rich, no one who was influ- 
ential either with the Jewish populace or with the eccle- 
siastical or political authorities, both of which had con- 
curred in bringing Him to the cross. He was entirely 
in their power, and they had all the instrumentalities 
for carrying out their design to put Him to death, and 
were vigilantly and industriously using those appliances. 
The leaders of the ecclesiastical party, who had not 



THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 329 

shrunk from conspiracy, and lying, and blasphemy, and 
the murder of the innocent, could not endure that their 
feast should be denied by the sight of men dying on 
three crosses near Jerusalem on the high Sabbath of 
their church. Moreover, they did not know what effect 
the sight of the body of the innocent Jesus might have 
upon the fickle populace, who might still rescue Him ; 
so the ecclesiastics went to Pilate to ask that the death 
of the three crucified men might be hastened by the 
breaking of their legs, and that the bodies might be 
buried. Pilate had no care now as to what might hap- 
pen. He consented. 

The rude executioners did not hesitate with the two 
thieves. They were soon dispatched. But when the 
soldiers saw Jesus they were convinced that He was 
thoroughly dead. It were a wanton act to crush His 
limbs. One of the soldiers, more daring and hardened 
than the others, in order to make assurance doubly sure, 
thrust a spear into the side of Jesus, and forthwith 
there issued water and blood. The remarkable events 
of the past few hours, and the certainty of the death of 
the condemned, had probably removed all restraint, and 
any one might approach the cross. It was so low, — not 
lifting the body many feet above the ground, as the 
painters have it, — that John could distinctly see what 
was going forward. When his account was written, it 
had not yet been suggested that Jesus had not died but 
had passed into a swoon from which He subsequently 
revived. He could not have invented the statement to 
meet a theory which had no existence in his day. 

His statement of facts John connects with two pas- 
sages from the sacred Hebrew books, namely, those 



330 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

which provided that not a bone of the paschal lamb 
should be broken (as Exodus xii., 46, and Numbers ix., 
12), and the passage in Zechariah (xii., 10), in which 
John undoubtedly understood the prophet as predicting 
that the people should pierce Jehovah in the person of 
the Messiah, and should have great grief therefor. 
Then Jesus was certainly dead.* 

TWO SANHEDRISTS BURY HIM. 

At that time there were two men in Jerusalem who 
were rich, high-minded, intelligent members of the 
Sanhedrim, but taking no part in the persecution and 
slaughter of Jesus. Their names were Joseph of Ari- 
mathea and Nicodemus, the latter having had an inter- 
view with Jesus. Both these men believed Jesus to be 
both great and good. They had absented themselves 
from the Sanhedrim, which had been called together that 
morning by the high-priest. Each was probably igno- 
rant of the feelings of the other. But they could not 
vote to execute Jesus, and they had not the courage to 
defend Him. Now they discover each the other's long 
regard for Jesus, and they unite in showing delicate 
attentions to the remains of the crucified Prophet. Pi- 
late granted the body. Joseph brought a linen shroud, 
and Nicodemus brought the spicery. 

There is a pensive beauty in John's simple statement: 
" In the place where He was crucified there was a gar- 
den ; and in the garden a new sepulcher, wherein was 
never man yet laid." Matthew says that this sepulcher 
was Joseph's " own new tomb, which he had hewn out 

* " The physical causes of the death of Jesus " I have discussed carefully in 
"The Light of the Nations,' 1 pp. 679-684. 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 331 

in the rock." The place was near, and these good men, 
with pious hands, bore Jesus to it, and thus saved Him 
from being flung into a common ditch with the male- 
factors who were crucified with Him. These two men 
seem to have had no helpers. The friends of Jesus had 
fled. His enemies had returned to the city. Alone 
and solitary, these honorable counselors lifted and 
wrapped and carried and interred the body of Jesus 
of Nazareth. Joseph rolled up a great stone to the 
door of the tomb. It was " the Jews' preparation- 
day." He and Nicodemus left the garden to prepare 
for the Passover. 

Now, if Jesus had not been really dead that fact would 
have been discovered by one or both of these men, who, 
in intelligence, surpassed the friends of Jesus. If the 
body had shown any signs of life they would not — they 
could not have confined it by closing the mouth of the 
cave-tomb. But that is just what they did. It was not 
two Galilean fishermen, but two learned and godly law- 
yers and senators who united in the opinion that Jesus 
was dead ; and the friends of Jesus believed He w r as 
dead ; and the enemies of Jesus believed He was dead ; 
and the Eoman soldiers believed He was dead. 

HE WAS BURIED SECURELY. 

In Joseph's sepulcher the body of Jesus lay through 
the whole of the Sabbath-day of April 8th, a.d. 30, so 
far as any evidence appears. 

At the close of the Sabbath, the chief-priests and 
Pharisees went to Pilate and said, " Sir, we remember 
that that deceiver said, while He was yet alive, ' After 
three days I will rise again.' Command, therefore, that 



332 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

the sepulcher be made secure until the third day, lest 
His disciples come by night and steal Him away, and say 
unto the people that He is risen from the dead, and so 
the last deceit be worse than the first." Pilate could 
have been in no sweet mood, but there was no reason 
why he should not grant their request. He had been 
forced by them to consent to the death of the young 
teacher : he might as well yield this also. He cared 
nothing for the result, and could have taken no interest 
in the predictions of a man whom he regarded as a harm- 
less and unfortunate fanatic. He was cross. Yes, they 
shall have a guard, these mad priests who are frightened 
by a dead peasant ! If it gratifies them to make fools 
of themselves they may do so : he will not hinder ! He 
said to them, ' ' Ye shall have a watch : go your way, 
make it as sure as you can." So they went and made 
the tomb secure. It would seem that they removed the 
great stone and examined the tomb and found the body 
there on Saturday evening after sun-down. Being so 
satisfied, His bitterest enemies rolled back the stone to 
the mouth of the tomb and added the precaution of 
sealing it. And the Roman guard took possession. No 
greater security was practicable. So they retired for 
the night and the soldiers remained. 

THE OPENED SEPULCHER EMPTY. 

Mary of Magdala and other women, knowing that the 
burial of Jesus by Joseph and Nicodemns had been hur- 
ried, although decent, had gone out on Saturday even- 
ing, the Sabbath being past, and had procured sweet 
spices, and were waiting anxiously for the morning 
which should follow the Sabbath, that they might go 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 333 

and anoint the precious body, performing love's last 
offices before Jesus should be left, as they supposed, to 
lie forever in that grave. They knew that a great 
stone had been placed over the mouth of the sepul- 
cher, but they do not seem to have known any thing of 
the government seal on the tomb, nor of the Eoman 
guard. While it was yet dark, as they approached the 
garden they questioned how they might remove the 
stone. When they reached the spot they saw that the 
tomb was open. There flashed upon the mind of the 
devoted Mary of Magdala the suspicion that the beloved 
body had been removed by the enemies of Jesus and that 
outrages may have been committed upon it. She left 
the other women and rushed into the city and found 
Peter and John, and communicated the startling news 
to them. Both men rose and went out to the sepulcher. 
Peter had behaved so basely that he did not feel as if he 
were of the number of the disciples. But he had 
repented, and he loved the brotherhood of the disciples, 
and he loved his dead Master, and he would gladly make 
amends for his denials by devotion to the corpse of 
Jesus. Still the burden of the bad memory was on him. 
He did not go as fleetly as John. Both ran ; but John 
reached the sepulcher first. There a reverent awe 
checked him. He kneeled down and looked at the 
grave-clothes. Peter followed, and went right in. There 
lay the shroud wrapped up, and the napkin, which per- 
haps Mary of Magdala had wound about His mangled 
head. Every thing was orderly. He had been taken 
away by neither friends nor foes. The former would 
have had no care for the clothes, or have not removed 
them ; the latter would have torn them away carelessly. 



334 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

It looked as if Jesus had risen and carefully folded and 
laid away the garments of the grave, wherewith the 
hands of respect and love had wrapped Him. 

Peter induced John to follow him. Peter was puz- 
zled. In John there began to spring up some faith. 
" He saw and believed " ; for as yet, according to John's 
own testimony, " they did not know the Scripture, that 
He must rise again from the dead." Then they left the 
sepulcher and went home. 

WHO LOVES MOST SEES FIRST. 

But Mary of Magdala stood without at the sepulcher, 
weeping. The men might go, but she lingered about 
the spot where she had last seen the body of Him whom 
she loved with all her heart and soul. She was alone. 
Hers was an absorbing love and an absorbing grief. She 
gazed through her tears down into the sepulcher 
where the dear Jesus had been laid. She was flooded 
with sorrow. She saw the two angels in white, but she 
had no attention to give to even angels. Nothing in 
heaven or earth could interest her but Jesus. They 
said to her, a Woman, why are you weeping?" She 
could not be astonished or frightened even by so brilliant 
an apparition as two angels ; but she was ready to burst 
forth when the subject of her love was touched. She 
sobbed out, " Because they have taken away my Lord, 
and I know not where they have laid Him ! " 

What marvelous beauty of loving is here ! " My 
Lord ! " It was the emphasis of appropriating affection. 
He was hers more than He was any other's. She loved 
Him more than any other woman or any man loved 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 335 

Him. And He had done every thing for her. She did 
not ask the angels for any consolation ; she was inconsol- 
able. She turned to go, and through her tears she saw 
a man standing in the garden. She scarcely looked at 
him. One man filled her heart and brain and eyes, and 
He was dead, and His dear body was stolen. When the 
stranger asked her, " Why do you weep ? whom do you 
seek ? " she thought it was the gardener, and that he 
must know all about it. Her reply was, " Sir, if you 
have borne Him hence, tell me where you have laid 
Him, and I will take Him away ! " 

What marvelous beauty of loving is here! "Him" 
— as if everybody must know Mary's "Him"! If it 
were not considered meet for His corpse to be in that 
garden because He had died as a malefactor — although 
she felt that that body, if laid down on God's throne, 
would sweeten all heaven — she would take it away to 
some place where, without interruption, He might sleep 
the sleep of the dead, and she might weep the tears of 
the dying. She had not turned to gaze full on the 
speaker. It was Jesus, and she did not know it. He 
said to her, " Mary ! " In His lifetime it is probable 
that He had never called the other Marys with the tone 
in which He was accustomed to pronounce her name, 
the poor dear friend whom He had brought out of the 
darkness of insanity with the marvelous light of His 
love. The syllables in the familiar tone thrilled her. 
She turned. She saw Him. She knew it was Jesus. 
She sprang toward Him, saying, " Eabboni ! " It seems 
that she would have embraced Him, but Jesus checked 
her. He said, " Touch Me not, for I am not yet as- 



336 THE GOSPEL OF SPJKITUAL INSIGHT. 

cended to My Father : but go to My brethren and say 
unto them that I ascend unto My Father and your Father, 
to My God and your God." 

Then Mary of Magdala, lovingest of women, out of 
whom Jesus had cast seven devils and into whom seven 
angels had come, sad Mary, glad Mary, left her Lord 
and went about the errand on which He sent her. 

THEN "THE OTHER WOMEN." 

Christ's interview with Mary was exceedingly brief. 
Before the other women could reach the city Jesus was 
with them. He met them. He saluted them with " All 
hail ! " Combining the accounts given by Mark and 
Matthew, a very natural history seems to me to be this : 
The women had entered the sepulcher and seen where 
Jesus lay ; then they had the vision of the angels ; then 
they went out "quickly" and fled from the sepulcher, 
for they trembled and were amazed, "and departed with 
fear and great joy." Leaving the sepulcher in great agi- 
tation, they may have wandered off from the city quite 
as naturally as toward it ; but recalling the message of 
the angel to the disciples, their joy predominated; their 
mental equipoise began to return. To make up the lost 
time they began to run, and thus they met Jesus. They 
knew Him at once. As soon as He saluted them they 
fell at His feet, clasping them and rendering Him hom- 
age. He permitted in them what He had forbidden in 
Mary of Magdala. Their worship and their feelings 
were quite different from those of the loving Mary. 
Jesus soothed them, saying, " Be not afraid ; go tell the 
brethren that I go into Galilee, and there shall they see 
Me." (« Light of the Nations," pp. 690, 691.) 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 337 

So " this same Jesus " who had been crucified and 
pierced with a spear and buried two nights and parts of 
three days had risen and been seen by some of His disciples. 
They proclaimed Him risen. They challenged the exhi- 
bition of the body if He had not risen. Their enemies 
could not produce the body nor silence the enthusiastic 
apostles. 

Here, then, at the time of a political and religious 
crisis, when the Roman power should have investigated 
the matter, when two antagonistic parties were inter- 
ested in fastening the crime each upon the other, 
the seal of the Roman government is violated, and no 
investigation is made or even sought ! The conclusion 
is inevitable. 

DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE EARLIER THAN THE 

EVANGELY. 

But there is another element of evidence which enters 
into this examination, and conclusively establishes the 
resurrection of Jesus, even if all the details which we 
have gathered from the Evangelists be set aside. We 
have literary remains of the first century written before 
the Evangely, or any portion thereof, was produced. It 
has been historically established that Jesus of Nazareth 
was crucified in or near Jerusalem about a.d. 30. The 
earliest of the four gospels was produced not later than 
seventy years thereafter, and the latest not later than 
ninety years thereafter. Intermediately there were four 
documents produced and published, which are admitted 
to be genuine and authentic even by scholars and critics 
who are not believers in the gospels. These four letters 
are placed on the same footing as the Letters of Cicero, 



338 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

which were produced one hundred years earlier, and 
which are relied upon for knowledge of what was going 
on in Eome in the first half of the first century before 
Christ, just as the Memoirs of Talleyrand, now (1891) 
just published, let us into the state of French affairs at 
the close of the eighteenth and the earliest decades of 
the nineteenth century. The documents referred to are 
the four letters of Paul: one to the Galatians, written 
a.d. 55; two to the Corinthians, a.d. 56; and one 
to the Eomans, a.d. 59. The opinion of scholars, 
Christian and infidel, that these are authentic and that 
we are in possession of genuine copies, is unanimous. 
No living scholar rejects them, although some throw 
overboard all the rest of the New Testament. 

FOUR LETTERS OF PAUL. 

Let us critically examine what they prove. The latest 
was written within twenty-nine years of the death of 
Jesus; the earliest, still nearer to that event. It is as if 
any American who had been engaged in the Civil War 
should in 1891 give his memory of the affairs of this 
nation in the year 1862, the writer being now about fifty 
years of age, in the full possession of his ripened facul- 
ties and powers. Such was Paul. He was at least 
twenty-two years old when Jesus of Nazareth was cruci- 
fied. He was about thirty when, after having been an 
unbeliever, a disbeliever, a persecutor of the faith in 
Jesus, he was converted into a missionary of the new 
form of religion. For twenty years he had traveled 
from Syria to Spain. He was a man of great equipoise. 
He had so much learning and mental force that to-day 
he has more influence over the human intellect than all 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 339 

the men who existed in his century, except the Man of 
Galilee. 

What can we learn from this man's writings ? We 
learn that within a very few years after Jesus died there 
was a large company of people who went by His name 
and were kept together by their belief in His resurrec- 
tion; that they were wide-spread in Jerusalem, in Rome, 
in other cities; that they staked the truth and claim of 
Christianity on the fact of His resurrection; that al- 
though they differed in their opinions as to the general 
resurrection of the human body, yet as to the resurrec- 
tion of the body of Jesus they were perfectly unanimous, 
without a dissenting voice, without the suggestion of a 
suspicion of any contrary theory; that after more than 
a quarter of a century they were as unanimous in their 
belief that Jesus Christ had been killed and had risen 
from the dead as the American people to-day are that 
Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated President of the 
United States in March of 1861, and murdered in April, 
1865. For twenty years Paul had found this unanimity 
everywhere. He himself had never doubted the fact, 
had always declared it, and about the twenty-eighth 
anniversary of the event he wrote to the Corinthians 
that there were over two hundred and fifty persons then 
living who had seen Jesus after His resurrection, and 
that he himself was one of them, and that they rested 
the whole of Christianity on the fact: "If Christ be not 
risen then is our preaching vain, and your faith also is 
vain" (1 Cor. xv.). No man can preach Christianity if 
he do not believe that Christ has really risen. There is 
nothing peculiar to Christianity to be believed if there 
be any doubt of Christ's resurrection. Notice this, too: 



840 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

Some of those to whom he wrote did not believe in the 
general resurrection of the human body, and he was 
endeavoring to show them that they were in error, and 
his argument was that this error of theirs could not 
stand with what they all believed and all admitted and 
never questioned, namely, the resurrection of Jesus 
from the dead. If there had ever been a Christian who 
had ever denied the resurrection of Jesus, the Apostle's 
argument would have been futile, if not childish. But 
on the universal belief in the resurrection of Jesus that 
argument stood irrefutable. 

Now, then, every intelligent person in this age must 
believe that Jesus rose from the dead, or he must account 
for the sudden rise and the wide spread of the univer- 
sally-held belief in it as a fact. The Prophet had died 
as a malefactor. All of His adherents had abandoned 
faith in His claim to Messiahship. They broke up one 
Friday night. In three days they were gathered together 
and began to grow; in a quarter of a century they were 
all over the Roman Empire; to-day they are in all lands, 
and number millions, inducting the most acute and 
powerful and learned of men. For eighteen centuries a 
great superstructure has been growing in breadth, in 
height, in adornment, in grandeur, and in strength, 
and the whole rests upon one single, solitary proposition, 
namely, that Jesus Christ arose from the dead. 

Trying this question, then, by the common rules of 
testimony, we must conclude — unless the disciples were 
wilder enthusiasts than history or fiction anywhere pre- 
sents — in the nature of things, as the body of Christ was 
crucified, dead, and buried; and as on the third morn- 
ing He was not in the grave, and could not have been 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 341 

either in the hands of the Jews or in possession of His 
disciples; and as there are only three cases that can be 
supposed, and two are shown to be impossible; we must 
give up all reliance on human memory and human testi- 
mony, or be irresistibly driven to the conclusion that 
Jesus Christ arose from the dead. 

Moreover, on the hypothesis that Jesus Christ did not 
rise from the dead, the history of eighteen centuries 
becomes a chaos, and it is impossible to account for the 
present state of things in the world, especially for the 
survival of Christianity; but all things fall into place, 
and scientific demands are satisfied by the acceptance as 
a fact of the statement that Jesus the Crucified 

AROSE FROM THE DEAD. 









O God, Kinsman loved, but not enough! 

Man with eyes majestic after death, 

Whose feet have toiled along our pathways rough, 
Whose lips drawn human breath, 

By that one likeness which is ours and Thine, 
By that one nature which doth hold us kin, 

By that high heaven where, sinless, Thou dost shine, 
To draw us sinners in, 

By Thy last silence in the judgment-hall, 

By long foreknowledge of the deadly tree, 
By darkness, by the wormwood and the gall, 

1 pray Thee, visit me. 

Come, lest this heart should, cold and cast away, 

Die ere the Guest adored she entertain — 
Lest eyes which never saw Thine earthly day 

Should miss Thy heavenly reign. 

And deign, Watcher with the sleepless brow, 

Pathetic in its yearning — deign reply : 
Is there, Oh, is there aught that such as Thou 

Wouldst take from such as I? 

— Jean Ingelow. 



XXIV. 
5n ISoti) amottes. 



John XXIV. 

(1) After these things Jesus manifested Himself again to the dis- 
ciples at the sea of Tiberias ; and He manifested Himself in this 
wise. (2) There were together Simon Peter, and Thomas called 
Didymus, and Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, and the sons of Zeb- 
edee, and two other of His disciples. (3) Simon Peter saith unto 
them, ' ''I go a fishing" They say unto him, ' ' We also come with thee. " 
They went forth, and entered into the boat ; and that night they 
took nothing. (4) But when day ivas now breaking, Jesus stood on 
the beach : howbeit the disciples knew not that it u\as Jesus. (5) 
Jesus therefore saith unto them, "Children, have ye aught to eat ?" 
They answered Him, "No." (6) And He said unto them, "Cast the 
net on the right side of the boat, and ye shall find." They cast there- 
fore, and now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes. 
(7) That disciple therefore whom Jesus loved saith unto Peter, "It is 
the Lord." So when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he 
girt his coat about him (for he was naked), and cast himself 
into the sea. (8) But the other disciples came in the little boat (for 
they were not far from the land, but about two hundred cubits off), 
dragging the net full of fishes. (9) So when they got out upon the 
land, they see a fire of coals there, and fish laid thereon, and bread. 
(10) Jesus saith unto them, "Bring of the fish which ye have now 
taken." (11) Simon Peter therefore went up, and drew the net to 
land, full of great fishes, a hundred and fifty and three: and for 
all there was so many the net was not rent. (12) Jesus saith unto 
them, "Come, and break your fast." And none of the disciples inquire 
of Him, "Who art thou ? " knowing that it was the Lord. (13) Jesus 
cometh, and taketh the bread, and giveth them, and the fish likewise. 
(14) This is now the third time that Jesus was manifested to the 
disciples, after that He was risen from the dead. 



THE OHKIST IN BOTH WOELDS. 
APPEARANCE OF THE RISEN JESUS. 

THE accounts of the many and varied appearances 
of Jesus to His disciples during the forty days 
next after His resurrection must afford to every 
thoughtful man a subject for profoundly interesting 
study, and to every Christian heart abundant themes 
for comforting meditation. 

The appearance to Mary of Magdala, the loveliest and 
lovingest saint, has already been studied. That occurred 
early on Sunday morning, April 9, a.d. 30. It was 
His first appearance to a human being. Probably He 
did not show Himself to the guard. They had become 
frightened and had fled. The eyes of dear Mary of 
Magdala were the first to see Him, and to her the 
risen Saviour addressed His earliest communication. 
The very first word of the risen Lord was " woman." 
But His beloved did not know Him until He said 
"Mary." Her own name, uttered by the lips which 
must so often have pronounced it, spoken in. tones 
which even death and the grave had not altered, caused 
her to look up, and that great countenance of power 
and love, which life and death had combined to make 
most majestic, brought, with the recognition, her cry 
of rapture and surprise, and led to a brief conversation, 
in which Christ made no revelation from the world out 
of which He had just returned. 

It would appear that Mary was about to give Him the 



346 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

pure caress of her hands by clinging to the beloved 
form which, perhaps, she had ofttimes, with the Mother 
Mary, soothed by her touch. Jesus said : " Touch Me 
not ; for I am not yet ascended to My Father." This 
is a perplexing speech. Stier well says i ' that it all de- 
pends upon what Mary meant by her touching." Per- 
haps she intended to cling to Him, as a loving woman 
naturally would when she had received the beloved back 
from the grave. Now He warned her that this could 
not be, that the old familiar loving intercourse could 
not be renewed, that He had not reached that final 
estate in which there could be perfect union and confi- 
dential intercourse. They had had one sweet, pure, 
blessed relation of intercourse, which had been so help- 
ful to them both, but now death had made an interme- 
diate state, from which they should ascend to the final 
state of the spiritual life in heaven, until which con- 
summation she, of all women, would do well to restrain 
her love's outgoings. She would clasp Him to hold. 
•Him, but He forbade it, that she might know that His 
return was but for a season. She saw her risen Lord 
as one who had come to remain ; He knew that He was 
soon going again. She saw the meeting in a human 
way, He in a divine. He knew that Mary might miss 
a higher, a spiritual, apprehension and embracing of 
His very Self if she were indulged in any sentimental 
effusion toward His body, even though it was a body 
which had passed through the grave. 

THE FIRST PREACHER OF THE GOSPEL A WOMAN. 

But in moderating the storm of her delight He 
charges her with a great commission. He bestows upon 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 347 

her the greatest honor ever given to any woman, namely, 
that she have the first announcing of the greatest fact 
that ever came into the biography of God or man, the 
fact which gives its supreme importance to the whole 
career of Jesus, the fact which is the key-stone that 
holds the whole arch of His life and religion from fall- 
ing, namely, His Resurrection from the Dead. The 
cure of effusive and useless sentimentality is action. 
Jesus did not leave Mary — let us mark that — but lov- 
ingly sent her away to be the first preacher of Gospel 
doctrine. Troops of angels announced His birth ; one 
woman, His Mary, worth a thousand angels, announced 
His resurrection. " Go : go unto My brethren, and 
say unto them, i I ascend to My Father and your Father, 
to My God and your God/ " 

There was that in the look and tone of Jesus which 
met response in the love and veneration of Mary, send- 
ing her quickly on her blessed errand : and this ivoman 
i( preached to the disciples (1) that she had seen the 
Lord, and (2) what things He said to her." In that 
discourse of the first Preaching Woman we have the two 
themes of all Christian preaching ever since, namely, 
(1) the fact of the resurrection of Jesus, and (2) the 
doctrines which, for their importance, rest upon that 
resurrection. 

THE THREAD OF THE STORY. 

It may be well to gather the threads of the story, so as 
to give the appearances of Jesus chronologically. It will 
be remembered that on this first Easter morning, Mary 
of Magdala and three other devout women, all devoted 
to Jesus, had come to the sepulcher to perform offices of 



348 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL IHSIGHT. 

love toward the body of Jesus. When they found that 
the stone had been rolled away, Mary of Magdala flew 
back to John and Peter. The three women, Mary 
(Zebedee's wife), Salome, and Joanna, entered the sepul- 
cher. Mark that the names of all who entered the 
tomb are preserved. They do not seem to have noticed 
the angel until they had ascertained the absence of 
Jesus. They were sorely perplexed. Perhaps they had 
gone into an inner chamber of the tomb, and returned, 
after finding that the corpse was missing, when the 
angel revealed himself to them. Luke says there were 
two angels, or rather, "two men in long shining gar- 
ments." The women were afraid. They bowed their 
heads. The angel said, "Do not be afraid, for I know 
that you seek Jesus who was crucified. Why do you 
seek the living among the dead ? He is not here. He 
is risen, as He said. Come and see the place where 
they laid Him." He showed them the spot, and the 
grave-clothes lying in order, and then said, "Kemem- 
ber how He spoke to you when He was yet in Galilee, 
saying that the Son of Man must be delivered into the 
hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third 
day rise again." The women then distinctly recalled 
that prediction. The angel added, " Go your way 
quickly, and tell His disciples, even Peter, that He is 
risen from the dead, and goes before you into Galilee. 
There you shall see Him, as He said to you." The 
women started off toward the city, full of mingled fear 
and joy. They missed Peter and John and Mary, who 
were approaching the sepulcher. Angels had announced 
to them the glad evangel which Jesus had told to His 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 349 

Mary. They saw only angels : dear Mary of Magdala 
saw Jesus. 

When Mary left Jesus, He appeared to the three other 
women, meeting them before they could reach the city. 
The account of that meeting is given on page 336. It 
will be remembered that Jesus sent these women to tell 
His disciples that He would go into Galilee, and that 
they would see Him there. When these women went 
with their message to the apostles, the men did not 
believe them, but what was reported seemed to them like 
"crazy talk" (Luke xxiv., 11). The disciples of Jesus 
can never be charged with inordinate credulity. 

APPEARING TO PETER. 

It was some time during that Sunday morning that 
Jesus appeared to Peter. We learn of this only by two 
incidental allusions. When the two disciples returned 
from Emmaus, as we shall see, and told the other disci- 
ples that they had seen and talked with the Lord, then 
they learned that He had also appeared to Peter. Indeed, 
it would seem that just as they entered the room, before 
they could tell their story, the eleven met them with 
the glad announcement, " The Lord is risen indeed and 
has appeared unto Simon" (Luke xxiv., 34), and Peter 
was there to corroborate it. St. Paul, in speaking of 
those who had seen the risen Christ (1 Cor. xv., 5), 
mentions Peter first and alone. " He was seen of 
Cephas, then of the twelve." 

It is to be noticed that Christ's first appearance was 
to an individual, a woman, the woman who had loved 
Him most and been most devoted and held the most ten- 
der and confidential relations with Him. His second to 



350 THE GOSPEL OP SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

three women*. His third to an individual, a man, the 
man who had been at one time the most zealous of His 
champions, but had proved to be the only man of 
His twelve chosen apostles who could deny Him to His 
face. Even Judas had not done that. We can under- 
stand why Jesus had met Mary first of all and in holy 
solitude. He does the same with Peter. 

Poor Peter ! The look which Jesus gave him at the 
denial must have haunted him. He could hardly have 
counted himself longer among the disciples. But he 
had sought John, or John had sought him, and they 
were both together when dear Mary of Magdala came 
with the tidings of the resurrection. In his impetuosity 
he had walked off with John to the sepulcher. He had 
dared to enter it. His examination satisfied him that 
Jesus had arisen. Then he left the sepulcher, with no 
comfort in his heart. Would the Lord ever appear to 
him ? No message had come by Mary. 

We may fancy him wandering about Jerusalem and so 
perhaps finding the women at the moment when he was 
tossed by torturing alternations of hopes and fears, and 
had learned that an angel had sent him a message by 
them, saying, " Go your way and tell His disciples, even 
Peter, that He goeth before you into Galilee ; there ye 
shall see Him." He was then to see the Lord ; but how 
would he be received by Him toward whom he had be- 
haved most basely? 

Perhaps it was while he was thinking thus — saying 
over to himself, "Even Peter! Even Peter!" that 
Jesus appeared to him. What the salutation was, what 
the discourse between them, as to its manner or its 
words, we may never know. A sacred veil hangs over 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 351 

that sacred interview. But from that hour Peter was 
transformed. He returned to the company of the apos- 
tles, and was with them to give the glad tidings that 
Jesus had appeared to him also ! "Even Peter ! " 

APPEARING TO THE DISCIPLES GOING TO EMMAUS. 

In the afternoon of that first Easter two disciples left 
Jerusalem to walk to Emmaus, a village seven miles 
distant. The name of one is preserved : it was Oleopas ; 
but we know not who he was. They started probably 
about half-past three o'clock, after the evening sacrifice. 
They had heard the reports which seemed to have been 
circulated among the friends of Jesus that the sepulcher 
was empty. As they walked they conversed upon the 
subject nearest to all their hopes and fears and interests, 
the dead Jesus, and what had happened in the three 
eventful days. They were perplexed. They " reasoned." 
They were probably striving to reconcile the apparently 
conflicting facts, the claims of Jesus and His manifest 
power, with the ignominious death which He had suf- 
fered. Jesus drew near and walked with them ; but 
they were so absorbed that they did not notice Him. 

Jesus spoke to them respectfully in such a way as not 
to-be offensive even in a stranger. "What are these 
words that ye exchange one with another as ye walk ? " 
Luke says that " they stood with sorrowful counte- 
nances." They looked at Jesus, but did not recognize 
Him. The same historian says, " Their eyes were holden 
that they should not know Him." Mark says that 
Jesus "appeared in another form unto them." It is to 
be noticed that some change must have passed in the 
appearance of His person. None of His friends recog- 



352 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL ItfSlGHT. 

nized Him immediately on first sight ; but none failed 
to recognize Him before they parted. Who can tell 
what that change was ? It was His own body. They 
all saw, and some touched Him. Was the grossness of 
the material body disappearing, and the fineness of the 
spiritual body coming forth ? 

On the way the Master and the disciples had a most 
interesting conversation, which the Evangelist relates. 

Upon reaching the house where they were to abide, 
Jesus was about to take His leave and pass on. But He 
had been so charming a talker, His glowing eloquence 
had so won the hearts of His two ingenuous listeners, that 
they urged Him to stay with them. He consented. 
When the meal was spread Jesus assumed the host's 
place. As they reclined at the table, He took bread 
and uttered the usual thanksgiving, which, according to 
the Jewish ritual, was obligatory where three ate to- 
gether. There was something in the tone, or there was 
some change came over Jesus, which caused them to 
recognize their dear dead Friend, or, perhaps, as He 
broke the bread they saw His wounded hands. " Their 
eyes were opened," says Luke. At that instant Jesus 
became invisible to them. 

Then they said to each other: "Did not our hearts 
burn within us as He talked to us by the way, and 
opened the Scriptures to us ? " They were so excited at 
what had happened that they arose and returned to 
Jerusalem. It must have been night, but enough was 
happening to draw the little circle closer together. When 
Cleopas and his companion reached the city they found 
the eleven apostles together and others of the disciples. 
As soon as they entered some one said to them: "The 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 353 

Lord is risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon." 
And perhaps all the strange occurrences of the day, so 
far as they knew them, were related by the company to 
the two who had just come from Emmaus. 

APPEARING TO THE TEN. 

We are to remember that there never were men more 
incredulous than were these first disciples of Jesus. 
Here were His eleven apostles gathered on the evening 
of the first Easter. Only one of them had seen Him. 
The other ten had that one apostle's testimony, which 
was corroborated by the strange talk of the women and 
this new account of the two men, not " apostles," just 
come from Emmaus. There was great incredulity in 
the company, and much perplexity. They all believed 
that He was no longer in the sepulcher; but His appear- 
ance to Mary and the other women, and Simon, who 
professed to have seen Him, seemed to them like hallu- 
cination. The story told by the Emmaus disciples 
increased the perplexity of the company. Jesus was 
seen so often, in such different places, so near the same 
time, and vanishing so strangety, and yet He had not 
visited the apostles as a body. It began to be frightful. 

It was probably the first time they had been gathered 
together since the supper with Jesus on Thursday night. 
They were afraid of the church authorities, and so the 
doors were shut. Just when they were in most perplex- 
ity, Jesus suddenly appeared in their midst. Whether 
He opened the door, or was admitted by the doorkeeper, 
who might have seen that it was Jesus, or whether it 
was accomplished in some inexplicable way, we can not 
say. Here is the simple historical statement. It shows 



354 THE GOSPEL OF SPIEITUAL INSIGHT. 

that He was no longer in the grave, but was in bodily 
intercourse with the disciples. As He entered He said: 
" Peace to you ! " It was His usual salutation. But 
they were terrified and affrighted. Their nerves were 
unstrung by the events of the day. They were so 
agitated that they did not notice His salutation. 

He said to them: " Why are you troubled ? And why 
do reasonings arise in your hearts ? " He saw that they 
regarded Him as some strange "appearance" merely. 
He reproved them for not believing the men and women 
who had seen Him and reported His resurrection, thus 
preparing them for His coming into their midst. He 
exhibited the wounds which they knew he had received 
in crucifixion. "Behold My feet and My hands, that it 
is I Myself: handle Me, and see: for a spirit has not 
flesh and bones as you see Me have." 

THE RISEN MASTER EATS WITH HIS DISCIPLES. 

Whether they touched Him or not we do not know; 
they might have done so. But they were overjoyed and 
behaved just as people would behave who' were not play- 
ing a part or posturing for effect. Jesus said very sim- 
ply: "Have you anything to eat here?" They gave 
Him some broiled fish and some honeycomb. He took 
them and ate, the whole company beholding Him. And 
while eating He .said to them: "These are the words 
which I spoke to you while I was yet with you, that all 
things must be fulfilled which are written in the law of 
Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms, concern- 
ing Me." These are the parts into which they were 
accustomed to classify the canonical Scriptures. He 
showed that these all pointed to His death and resurrec- 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 355 

tion. He concluded by adding: "Thus it is written that 
the Christ should suffer, and rise from the dead the 
third day, and that repentance for the remission of sins 
should be proclaimed in His name among all the nations, 
beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these 
things: and, behold, I send the promise of the Father 
upon you: but tarry in the city until you be endued 
with power from on high." He cleared up for them a 
point which was greatly dark to the Jewish mind, 
namely, that the Christ, the Messiah of God, should be 
a sufferer. They had thoroughly misread the Scriptures. 
We need not be surprised at that, when we see how tra- 
ditional readings of the New Testament come to have 
such influence on men, that when one gives a natural 
and consistent interpretation it often seems a shocking 
innovation. His command to remain in Jerusalem 
must be understood as making that their center and 
headquarters, as we soon see them ordered to Galilee for 
a season. 

GIVES THEM THE HOLY SPIRIT. 

John records that Jesus again said, "Peace unto you! 
As My Father has sent Me, I also will send you." And 
then He breathed on them, and said : " Eeceive the 
Holy Spirit. If you remit the sins of any, they shall 
be remitted to them ; and if you retain the sins of any, 
they are retained." The act of breathing seems sym- 
bolical. These men were from that time very different 
from the men they had been before. They were wiser, 
better, deeper, more holy men. The last words are 
not to be interpreted as conferring upon any corporate 
body of officials the authority to bind upon their fellow- 



356 THE GOSPEL OF SPIKITUAL IHSIGHT. 

men the sins of which they have been guilty, and to 
forgive authoritatively all whom they choose to forgive. 
Consider (1) that the company addressed were not the 
twelve apostles, because there were other persons pres- 
ent to whom the Holy Spirit was given, if given to any, 
and who received this authority quite as much as the 
apostles, of whom there were only ten present, the 
place of Judas Iscariot not having been filled, and 
Thomas Didymus being absent. (2) Moreover, there is 
not the slightest historical evidence that any of this 
company, whether disciples or apostles, ever, separately 
or conjointly, attempted to exercise what came long 
afterward, in churchly corruptions, to be called "abso- 
lution." This pretense of priestcraft rests itself alto- 
gether on a misrepresentation of this passage. 

This saying of Jesus seems to mean that to those men 
would be given by the Holy Spirit the ability to discern, 
as Christ then gave them power to declare, as He did 
to all the other witnesses of His reappearance, what is 
right and what is wrong, according to the principles of 
Christian ethics. Only this ; nothing more : and this 
is much. As what they should set forth of their risen 
Saviour was to be the only rule of faith, so what 
they should set forth of the morals of Christianity 
should be the rule of Christian practice. Since the last 
of those who actually saw the risen Jesus spoke and 
wrote it has been true that "if any man shall add 
unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues 
that are written in th'is Book, and if any man shall take 
away from the words of the Book of this prophecy, 
God shall take away his part out of the Book of Life " 
(Rev. xxii., 18, 19). 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 357 



APPEARING TO THOMAS. 

Thomas had been absent from this Easter evening 
meeting when the Lord visited the company of the dis- 
ciples. We can only conjecture, we do not know, the 
reasons of this absence ; but we do know that there was 
no more manly and loyal soul in that circle. His breth- 
ren told him of their meeting with Jesus, and they 
probably told him that the Master's appearance had 
changed, and may have confessed that they had not 
touched Him. Through all that week Thomas remained 
incredulous. To all their repeated representations 
Thomas at last gave his decided answer : " Unless I 
shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and thrust 
my hand into His side, I will not believe." He was all 
the week in this unhappy state of mind. If his friends 
were mistaken, they were at least happy. 

And so another Sabbath passed, and another Sunday. 
The friends of Jesus were collected again. On Sunday, 
April 16, in the evening, Thomas was now with them. 
Jesus suddenly stood in their midst, as He had done 
eight nights before. He repeated the usual salutation, 
" Peace unto you ! " Then turning at once to Thomas, 
He said, " Reach hither thy finger, and see My hands ; 
and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into My side, 
and be not faithless, but believing. " Thomas had gazed 
at Him through all this speech. It was not a ghost. 
It was not a phantasm. It was The Master. However 
changed, it was undoubtedly lie. Thomas knew the 
voice. The Master probably had not met any of the 
disciples during the intervening week, else they would 
have told Thomas. But Jesus knew his very thoughts, 



358 THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

and repeated his very words, and offered Himself to the 
very test which Thomas had proposed. Thomas, who 
had been so skeptical, instantly believed of Jesus three 
things : that He retained His personality ; that He 
could be where He would at any moment ; and that He 
knew all things. The whole infidelity of Thomas broke 
down at once. He acknowledged all. The resurrection 
of Jesus was an accomplished fact. Here were the 
pierced hands, and ankles, and side. He was omnipres- 
ent. He was omniscient. All the preconceptions of his 
brethren in regard to their Master were below the fact. 
He was very God. Thomas worshiped Him, calling Him 
" My God." Jesus recognized the faith of Thomas in His 
Godhead as correct, and while receiving the homage due 
only to God, He administered a mild rebuke for the slow- 
ness of the faith of Thomas : " Thomas, you have be- 
lieved because you have seen Me : blessed are they that 
have not seen, and have believed." 

GOING TO GALILEE. 

The first six appearances of Jesus had occurred in or 
near Jerusalem. It bound the disciples into a company 
of believers. But as yet they had no plan. The eleven 
apostles left the metropolis for Galilee (Matt, xxviii., 
16). At the last supper He had said to them words 
which were then incomprehensible : " After I am risen 
again, I will go before you unto Galilee" (Mark xiv., 
28). And the angel at the sepulcher had reminded the 
women of that promise, and directed them to " tell 
His disciples, and Peter, that He goeth before you 
unto Galilee." Naturally, they would prudently remain 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 359 

in Jerusalem until the close of the Passover. They 
would then follow the direction of Jesus, and go back 
to their old homes in Galilee. Beyond that they had 
no direction, except the knowledge of the fact that they 
were to come back to Jerusalem and await the gift of 
the Holy Spirit. They did not know when that should 
occur ; in point of fact it did not occur until about two 
months afterward. While waiting for the reappearance 
of their Lord, and further directions, they naturally re- 
sumed their old employment on which their livelihood 
depended. One evening, on the shore of the Sea of 
Tiberias, Simon Peter said he should go a fishing. 
Thomas Didymus, and Nathanael of Cana, and James 
and John, and two other apostles, who are not named, 
were of the company. These seven were all experi- 
enced fishermen, but they toiled all night and caught 
nothing. 

APPEARANCE BY THE SEA OF TIBERIAS. 

At break of day Jesus was standing on the shore; but 
His disciples did not recognize Him. It is related of 
each appearance of Jesus after His resurrection that He 
was not recognized at first sight by His most intimate 
friends. They had, then, no great credulousness. They 
saw the stranger, standing on the shore, as an early pur- 
chaser of fish might be who stood where he saw the men 
fishing and awaited an opportunity to buy. At last He 
said, "Boys, have you any meat?" The form of the 
question would not arouse the suspicion that it was Jesus. 
It was such as any passer-by might ask of an angler. 
They answered, "No." He said to them, "Cast the 



360 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 



net on the right side of the ship and you shall find." 
Even this did not reveal Jesus. Any man acquainted 
with the lake might have detected from the shore some 
sign of fish which had eluded their weary eyes. It was 
an easy thing to do; so they followed the stranger's 
direction, and they were not able to draw the net for the 
multitude of fishes. 

John's quick eye first recognized Jesus. He said to 
Peter, "It is the Lord." Since the crucifixion these 
two men, so much unlike, each having what the other 
lacked, had been drawn into a very close companionship. 
They were in a boat together. Peter, always impulsive, 
pulled on his fisher's coat to go to Jesus. The vessel 
was about three hundred feet from the shore. The 
other disciples came up to the help of John, and they 
dragged the net and the fishes near enough to the shore 
to secure them. 

Landing, they saw a fire of coals, and fish thereon, and 
bread. Jesus directed them to bring of the fish they 
had just caught; and Simon Peter, perhaps now recol- 
lecting how he had abandoned John, promptly obeyed 
the command, and landed the unbroken net with its 
contents of one hundred and fifty-three great fishes. 
Jesus then said, "Come and dine." Jesus divided the 
bread and the fish. It was a silent meal. A tender awe 
was on the company. The disciples knew it was "the 
Lord," as they had now learned to call Him, but they 
asked Him no questions. 



APPEARANCE TO A GREAT COMPANY. 

From Matthew's account (xxviii., 16) we learn that 
Jesus had appointed a time and a place in Galilee to 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 3G1 

meet His followers. We know of the time only that it 
was within forty days after the resurrection. The place 
was a mountain. It would seem that Mount Tabor 
would be the most convenient place for such an assem- 
blage. The fact that it was inhabited is against the 
t theory of those who would make it the scene of the 
Transfiguration, but is rather in favor of its selection 
for this meeting, as the inhabitants were Galilaeans, and 
would be at least not unfriendly to the followers of 
Jesus. Tabor is six miles east of Nazareth. On the top 
is a table about a mile and a half in circumference. 

This is the only occasion mentioned by any Evangel- 
ist which can correspond with a fact mentioned by Paul 
in his first letter to the Corinthians (xv., 6): " He was 
seen of above five hundred brethren at once." It would 
seem that the apostles had been at pains to make this 
appointment known to all who might be supposed to be, 
in any sense, disciples of Jesus. It was a large gather- 
ing. Afterwards, in Jerusalem, this company mustered 
only one hundred and twenty. While in Galilee, and 
before this meeting, the apostles had doubtlessly been 
industriously repeating the narrative of all the strange 
occurrences of the resurrection and the repeated appear- 
ances of Jesus. Thomas had most probably given an 
account of his mental processes by which he had gone 
over from despondent unbelief to exultant faith in Jesus 
as God, and had told how he had worshiped Jesus, and 
how the Master had received the homage due only to 
God. 

Jesus appeared in their midst. No account has been 
preserved of His manner of approach. When they saw 
Him the body of the disciples worshiped Him. 



362 THE GOSPEL OE SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 



APPEARANCE TO JAMES. 

There was another appearance of Jesus. It was to 
His brother James. All we know of "this is the state- 
ment of it by St. Paul (1 Cor. xv., 17). It was probably 
in May, a.d. 30. No account of the interview survives, 
if ever written. 

HIS FINAL APPEARANCE. 

The last appearance of Jesus was to His disciples in 
Jerusalem, on the fortieth day after His resurrection, 
which would be May 7th. He led them forth toward 
Bethany. Somewhere on the Mount of Olives He lifted 
up His hands, those pierced hands, to bless them, and 
while in the act of pronouncing His final benediction 
He was parted from them. In their sight He ascended. 
He passed into a cloud. The rapt disciples stood gazing 
up into that part oft the heavens where they had last 
beheld their Lord. Suddenly two men in white apparel 
stood beside the silent group, and one said, ( ' Ye men of 
Galilee, why do you stand gazing up into heaven ? This 
same Jesus, which is taken from you into heaven, shall 
so come in like manner as you have seen Him taken into 
heaven." 

That poor little company of believers, whose faith had 
been crushed, whose hopes had been extinguished, whose 
love had been baffled, returned to Jerusalem a believing, 
hopeful, loving, happy body of men, and began then 
and there to declare that Jesus was risen from the dead. 
In the face of Caiaphas and the Scribes and the Pharisees, 
and the hundreds who had seen Him hanging on the 
cross, they declared that He had been alive forty days; and 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 363 

they stood ready to prove it by half a thousand witnesses. 
And not a Scribe, not a Pharisee, not a priest, not any 
Jew, arose to declare, or even intimate, that it was false, 
and to produce facts to show it false. It was true, and 
they knew it, and by their silence they confessed it. 
Jesus had risen from the dead. 

CHARACTERISTICS OF HIS APPEARANCES. 

There are some characteristics of these appearances 
which may be worth studying. It is to be noticed that 
as He was born of a woman and not of a man, His first 
appearance was to one woman and His second to several 
women ; that His third was to one disciple alone, and 
His fourth to two, thus gradually preparing the minds 
and hearts of His disciples for His reception in a body ; 
that His fifth was apparently for the most hesitating 
of the company of His followers ; and that two of the 
appearances were probably in sight of Nazareth, where 
He had lived and labored, and that the last was in sight 
of Bethlehem, where He was born, of Gethsemane, where 
He had agonized, and of Golgotha, where He had been 
murdered. 

He appeared to Mary: Love is immortal. He appeared 
to the other women : Immortal Love honors by giving 
service. He appeared to Peter: Immortal Love forgives. 
He appeared to the disciples on the way to Emmaus : 
Immortal Love sympathizes. He appeared to Thomas, 
the honest doubter: Immortal Love is tenderly and 
instructively sympathetic. To the grief of love, of per- 
plexity, of penitence, and of doubt, Immortal Love comes 
up from the grave and pauses to give comfort before 
ascending into heaven. 



364: THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 

The scholarly Luke, in the opening of his book enti- 
tled the " Acts of the Apostles/' speaks of these epipha- 
nies, these reappearances of Jesus, in a very noteworthy 
manner. He gives the time, " forty days." He repre- 
sents the Lord as " showing Himself/' and showing 
Himself " alive/' in "many" ways that were "proofs 
infallible," and " speaking to them of things pertaining 
to the kingdom of God." 

The belief in His resurrection is not left to any one 
appearance, even if it had been to all the apostles and 
the Sanhedrim together. The agitation of mind unfit- 
ting them to test any thing would have prevailed through 
the whole of any one interview of any reasonable length. 
But He came repeatedly to different ones at different 
times and in different places, and sometimes to all to- 
gether. He touched them, ate with them, talked with 
them. He familiarized them so with His appearance 
that they could receive instruction as to what they were 
to do next. He accustomed them to regard Him on the 
divinity side of His existence. He did not stay with them 
as before His crucifixion. He was the same and yet differ- 
ent. His disappearances were as remarkable as His com- 
ings. As their crucified, risen Lord, He could make them 
see truth as they could not be made to see it before His 
death and resurrection. He gave them instruction in 
the kingdom of heaven. In their vision He grew from 
being a Jewish Rabbi into the king of the kingdom of 
heaven. In it all He seems to have made no intimation 
of any " church " in the* sense understood in this age. 
In that sense not one of those who consorted with Jesus 
through those forty days ever saw a (i church" or ever 
heard or spoke of such a thing as a " church." 



THE GOSPEL OF SPIRITUAL INSIGHT. 365 

One other thing is to be noticed. The appearances 
came always without announcement and closed with- 
out adieu: He came, no one knew how or whence. He 
went, no one knew how or whither. He went no more 
to mount or garden, no more to the Temple or the 
Bethany retreat. He came and went as always at home 
everywhere. He was here and there, the Master and 
the Lover of both worlds. 



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